The change came when Beijing issued it's 14-point list of demands to Australia. Just an indication as to how ignorant the demands were, one was that Australian media stop criticising the PRC. Aus rejected demands; PRC declared trade war. Aus won. Due to the Asian face concept, both sides are pretending the PRC did not end up conceding and backing down, but they did.
I have to more than agree with @johnpaul252003 that "winning"; is a pyrrhic victory when your win also means you get to continue shipping Australia's irreplaceable resources to China for China's benefit.
@@johnpaul252003Jeepers! Who ever said our wine industry was "decimated"? Wine growers are among the richest people in the country. I believe the crayfish industry got hit quite hard, but there again it's not as if crayfish were ever that cheap to buy anyway.
With reference to the purchase of new tanks, I can tell you that, during the Vietnam War, we discovered that, in a company level engagement, the presence of a troop of 3 tanks reduced friendly casualties by 80%. Also, nothing is better at holding ground than a tank, especially if it has time to dig in. In the Australian Army, tanks are primarily for infantry support.
@@michaelshurkin613 I think that's true for basically every weapon system we have/on order... 2/3 of the f35 are going to be based in nsw, which is like 2000/3000km from Tindal or Townsville (the likely forward staging bases for any defence). I'm not sure that this is possible with just drop tanks. Subs are based at ass end of the world... But yeah 70 sepv3 seems excessive given the ability for us to move around...
Place groupings of 50 tanks in separate storage areas spread across Australia. Have them all maintained and secured primarily by reservists. Send the active force around Australia in rotation to inspect and train with each of the stored tank inventory groups. Small active armor force, with over supply of equipment. This provides a quick reaction force to take control of some tanks and repel an invasion while also maintaining enough equipment to expand the force in case of war by adding manpower. This is essentially a strategic deterrent against invasion and will probably not be necessary to use in war but provides utility simply by existing for deterrence.
There's a cynical line in Australia about defence reviews: 'every defence review recommends 3 brigades, 100 combat aircraft, 10 surface ships and 6 submarines'. I might have the exact numbers wrong but it's close. That's what the defence establishment is comfortable with and what governments are prepared to fund.
Somewhat true, although our naval expansion (if achieved) does break that narrative. There also needs to be greater emphasis on similar capability growth in the RAAF.
I am a former Army Reservist in the Australian Army with a long term interest in defence and geo politics. The Reserves are woefully under resourced and ignored in defence planning. This is despite the fact that reserve personnel are an essential part of defence and were deployed to East Timor, Iraq and Afghanistan. In my opinion the reserves need to be more integrated with Regular forces so that there is regular training with both forces as interoperable exercises and regular soldiers on a 6 year contract being offered the chance to serve out their contract via reserve service for a longer time period.
Your observations on the Army are valid. Australia will only receive 129 Redback IFV’s down from the original planned 450 to replace the M113AS4 APC. As you say, a mere 129 IFV’s is only enough to equip one mechanised battalion. I expect the M113AS4 will remain in service which is less than ideal as it is obsolete. It is worth mentioning the Arafura offshore patrol vessel which was based on the Brunei Navy Darusalam class offshore patrol vessel. This went from being a planned 12 boats with some decent weapons such as a 57mm naval gun to now maybe only two boats with nothing more than a 25mm Bushmaster auto cannon and 2 x .50 calibre M2 HMG’s, basically the same armament as the Armidale class patrol boats which are being retired. The Arafura offshore patrol vessels will only have the armament to intercept illegal fishing vessels and people smugglers, not to project force or defend against a hostile actor. So a huge amount of money is being spent on what is a glorified police boat. The Arafura debacle shows Australia needs a seperate coast guard body to enforce our EEZ and perform policing duties and let the RAN concentrate on war fighting with a decent littoral and blue water fleet equipped with corvettes, frigates, destroyers, subs, mine hunters/mine layers, maybe some fast attack boats to support SF operations by the RAN CDT, SASR and Commando Regiment and LHD’s capable of amphibious assault with dedicated logistic ships. The current Advanced Cape Class patrol boats in the RAN should be transferred to Border Force Maritime Unit (a Federal law enforcement body) and then let the Navy concentrate on war fighting.
Agree with this 100% Why the RAN is tasked with constabulary operations is beyond me. I have nothing against the Navy assisting those operations where appropriate, but the Navy should be, first and foremost, a war fighting organisation.
Just a couple of updates of fact: The Australian Army contributed 1 x Corps of 5 Divisions by the end of the first World War in France. The first cooperation between Australian and US troops was at the Battle of Le Hamel on July 4th 1918. US troops fought under Australian Command there and later in the "100 Days" Campaign at the end of the war. Australian soldiers fought in North Africa, Greece and Crete during the second World War but all Austrlian soldiers were withdrawn to the Pacific after the Battle of El Alamein in 1942. The RAAF and RAN did contribute to the European theatre especially Bomber Command in operations over European cities.
The French didn't propose their Nuclear Nubmarine to the Australians because there was a taboo with other countries that it wasn't the type of weapon that could be sold on the international market. So the French were upset that: 1 - They got no warning 2 - They were lied to 3 - They didn't get invited into AUKUS as an Ally while they have territory in the pacific and they are very much conscerned with Pacific security (unlike the UK) 4 - They had started technology transfert of their submarine tech to Australians Sailors 5 - They didn't get to even compete for this new contract which could have benefited Australia if they truly wanted nuclear Subs 6 - That the other offers can't even deliver the Boats when they were already being build in France (they will get sold to the Netherlands now) 7 - They lost the contract. This diplomatic incident got played in the English media as the French being upset they lost money when it wasn't even in the top 5 reasons. It got painted as France being its usual Difficult self and asking for attention. It reinforced very much the French thinking that there is such a thing as an Anglosphere and they will NEVER be part of the club.
The more worrying is not even betraying a close allied. The more scaring is for Australia which will never get its Virginia submarines before they become deprecated. Double betrayed.
@@henryfynn7562 They're getting block IV boats. Not sure what you mean by 'deprecated' but they have a 33 year service life and the ones being bought will be as little as 6 years old.
@@PJH13 Good. Australia will have 1 sub in 6 years. But ""No serious observer of the US submarine industrial capacity thinks it will come anywhere near producing surplus submarines for Australia," Senator Shoebridge, USA
@@henryfynn7562 Yh, they aren't meant to be. The boats being sold aren't new Block Vs; they're already built and commissioned in the USN. Yes there's a delay, but there already was one on the Attack class. The differences is, the new deal plugs the gap via the US and UK are stationing subs in Australia to plug the capability gap, which France obviously couldn't do. In fact, one of the original reasons for going for the French design was it was a nuclear design that could easily be reverted back to, once nuclear propulsion was politically acceptable - the subsequent experience suggested such a switch wouldn't be nearly as easy as hoped, so they revaluated.
It's always a pleasure when I see a new video uploaded from you - sometimes I like to listen to them while working, but then end up taking a break from work because I want to focus on the video. Refined OSINT discussions are just my favorite thing.
Yes, although I've always thought the term funny. I'm certainly not Anglo-Saxon, and at any rate, the Normands conquered England and imposed themselves...if anything, they should be called Anglo-Normands.
@@michaelshurkin613 - Anglo-Dutch, if we include the last successful invasion of England. Securing the Protestant succession and the supremacy of the Commons over the defeated pro-French party of the Stuarts.
@andrewcombe8907 no, you cannot. 5 eyes and AUKUS demonstrated that there is clearly 2 categories of allies. The privileged one, the Anglosphere. And then all the other ones, Europeans or Asians.
The problem with a single focus force is Australia has to defend a continent. Finland and Poland have to defend a border of no more than 1000kms. For most Australians that’s a trip to the shops for a bottle of milk.
No, Churchill didn't - he guaranteed to divert an armoured division from the middle east in the case of a substantial Japanese invasion. and anything after April 42 doesn't matter, because by then we knew (from magic intercepts) that Japan had no plan to invade Australia.
Exactly, which is why in the occupation of Japan and in the Korean War, Britain was under Australian command, it was the only way that the Brits could be trusted.
Yeah, given that the UK was fighting for it’s very existence, with the threat of a Nazi invasion the UK government should have thrown all it’s resources onto the Far East theatre to prevent the the Japanese invading Dutch territory only a few hundred miles from the vast emptiness of the Australian North End. What an ignorant comment @AndrewBlucher.
Are you aware of the 3 significant joint US-Australian bases in Australia, Pine Gap, Nurrungar and the Harold Holt Joint Naval Facility? The force posture has changed from a 50km range, which was army focused, to a 200km + range which is an air and naval focus, to cut off threats. Growing up in the 1970s, I still remember that having the 3 facilities mentioned above made us targets for the Soviet block with intercontinental ballastic missiles. The younger generation doesn't remember that. For a true reading of the change of allegiance from the British Empire to the the US, you need to look up John Curtin WW2 and Winston Churchill relationship (it was frosty after Curtin recalled 2 army divisions to defend Australia from the European theatre of operations
We are America's bitch whether we like it or not, Australia has no autonomy. Scott Morrison who set up AUKUS, well guess what he's a highly paid consultant now in the U.S. Opportunistic parasite.
The Brisbane line... But don't worry, Russian gangsters were invading the Gold Coast a few years back, with Bikie support... All the drugs... There's a lot that goes on that isn't really mentioned in internal security failing, right alongside military procurement being wtf as well.
Great but do tell the real story of why the Singapore Armed Forces was formed and who taught them their doctrine (not world's favourite nation at this time) and it's evolution. Retired banker but 30 years ago conscripted as an rifleman when 18 like everyone else there.
It's not a bad analysis, mate. But some key points from an Aussie closely watching the affair play out. 1) we'll get the Virginia class subs. At the end of the day, the yanks will build, pay for, and crew them to patrol our north, OR we pay for and crew them to do the same thing. Between that and upgrading our West Australia dock facilities to support Virginia class subs (which the yanks can also use), they have all the incentives to deliver on the deal. 2) cost comparisons for Aussie military procurements are hard to compare. We use total costs over the 30 year life span of the project including all on costs. The figures are far beyond the actual purchase of the subs. 3) Lastly, the French nuclear option required maintenance and servicing by the French every several years. They are considered unreliable and fickle, so they are not trusted like our US and UK brothers and sisters. It was a non-starter from the get go. Also, the point at which we "woke up" about China was when they openly attempted economic cohersion (application of tarrifs) and released 14 "grievances" for which they tried to tell us to remedy.
The French are certainly unreliable, but it’s Europe not China that is our economic enemy, they’ve inflicted a punitive trade embargo on us for generations, even to the point of preferring imports from Russia over ours.
We actually pay a lot more than $2.6bn per VCS as of writing. Because of all of the shipbuilding inflation/escalation and new capabilities, we currently pay around $4-5bn for a Block V VCS con-VPM. I think the intent is to sell older VCS, but even if you tried to buy a Block V sans-VPM, you would probably run close to $4bn at current prices. $4.3bn is probably reasonable given the additional equipment and services a new operator would need.
I’m unsure about the whole nuclear submarine idea, long term if Oz wants to establish a nuclear industry, than yes. But I dislike the idea we don’t get these subs until 2040…. It’s kind of crazy.
.23 percent compensation payment to the French is a bargain compared to buying the wrong submarines for our new threat environment 🇦🇺 Abrahams were ordered in the context of the original IFV numbers so it’s not reasonable to question their acquisition on the reduced IFV order.
So where is Australia headed concerning this whole submarine disaster? Are they gonna have a gap between the retirement of the Collins class and the arrival of their next submarine? Or are they going to look for other options? Do they even have other options?
The Liberal-National Party coalition won't cancel AUKUS because it will offend the Americans. The Labor Party won't cancel AUKUS because it will offend the Liberal-National Party coalition.
A solution would be to buy the Rubis class submarines that the Frenchs are retiring instead of the Virginia's. Of course, it would depend of the condition of the hulls.They could be refueled, modernized with US equipment as the Attack subs were planned to be. It would mend relations with Frenchs and help US with sub building program which is lagging.
@@michaelshurkin613 Negative, Sorry I mean they went from 400+ ifv to 120? something? I feel like we would need more than that. Dont want to end up M113ing it.
It's simple. As the govt said, we are not going to fight a middle eastern war or one in central Queensland in the next 50 years. There is limited money and the army can't project power like the navy and airforce. Simple.
Because labor/ left are always week on defence and also they hate the army. They always want to gut it. If it wasn’t for the fact that the two armor (m1a2 and red back) projects were way into the advanced stages they would highly likely have cancelled them
@@Aussie-R How would we use 400 IFVs, how would we crew them, and more importantly, how would we deploy them? The thing here to remember is that we will have local and sovereign manufacturing here.
In the context of defence analysis we also need to look at Australia’s geo political role. We are the major democracy in the Southern Hemisphere. Below the equator we are the most powerful liberal democracy. Sydney is the New York of the Southern Hemisphere and Canberra should be the Washington of the Southern Hemisphere. We need to overcome cultural cringe and embrace this reality via active diplomatic engagement with local neighbours and strong defence ties with like minded allies in the region like the Philippines, Taiwan, Japan, NZ, Fiji etc. The Australian Federal Police can also play a role in this through peacekeeping operations. This also means we need a defence policy based on accepting that we are a regional leader as opposed to a mere follower of the US. We need to engage with local militaries by encouraging officer training at ADFA and Duntroon so that Australian officer standards are inculcated into our allies’ culture. Similar to what the British did with Sandhurst. Lastly in my opinion we need to transfer the constabulary/coast guard duties of the RAN to Border Force with a transfer of the patrol boats so that the RAN can just concentrate on war fighting. We should purchase corvettes with stand off missile capacity and maybe some fast attack boats for SF operations, build up our navy to a war fighting force and transfer the Cape Class Patrol Boats to Border Force. The AUKUS sub deal sounds like a boondoggle entered into for intelligence sharing and we should just get some German 218SG diesel electric subs like Singapore uses. I also think it is contentious but the Navy made a mistake in not having the Canberra class LHD’s able to operate the F35B to provide air cover for littoral/amphibious operations.
The Invincible Class (what the Singaporean's call their version of the TKMS 218SG) are half the size of the current Collin's Class by tonnage, with I would imagine significantly less weapons loadout to accommodate the AIP system. Not to mention a completely different and unfamiliar combat system, at least the Virginia and the upcoming AUKUS subs had and will have a combat system we currently use on the Collins. No chance that they will be able to accommodate the same range and time on station as the boats we are slated to get. You have a point that the patrol boats are constabulary vessels, but they are also a training ground for sailors to eventually deploy to and command one of the Major Fleet Units. We have too few. Perhaps the eventual General Purpose Frigates will go towards solving that problem we shall see. Deploying organic air support aboard the Canberra's I can't see as being a good move. You would take up valuable space for an amphibious force to accommodate a very modest fast jet air group, 6-8 F-35B's that will not be able to provide around the clock patrols. The Arafura were an attempt to get into the corvette game again whilst also replacing the Armidale's and Cape's but they have been left toothless by the apparent inability to integrate the selected 40mm OTO Marlin main gun. Basically they are just bigger, longer legged versions of the Capes now, which is a shame. There is some talk of smaller missile boats which could be interesting The Whiskey Project has vessels the US is trialing for themselves at the moment that we could use. Maybe a win for Australian industry there.
Very interesting and informative. I would say though, that while there was a lot of discussion in the media about choosing between China or America and some mining magnates were repeating Chinese talking points, there was never any serious debate in government about the primary importance of the US alliance.
@PaxAmericana do you think Australia would be better served with M10 bookers vs abrams. As the booker is in the same weight ~42 tons as the redback and offer a mobile large caliber tool to fill the same roll as the abrams.
Thx Michael, the "click" came as a result of a comment from the previous PM , concerning the origins of the coronaviras origin in Wuhan. It hit the Australian public like a kick to the "what it's", PM thrown out, military build. The second part about Subs, came about because, although many millions had been spent already, the French differing, could only be seen that it would last for years. Like all contracts, you go into them with knowledge of the penalty. Remember it was your President & British PM, that stood with our PM to confirm AUKUS. Now that might mean nothing to you, ( or even rest of world) but to us , it meant solid commitment . PS - immense work has already occurred in progression, Training/Maintenance/Facilities/Factories (both Au&UK).🇺🇸🇬🇧🇦🇺✔️✔️👍I hope.
I worry the US government promised something it couldn't deliver. I have reason to believe the part of the USG that engaged with AUS regarding a sub deal did not talk to the part of the USG that understands the state of US shipyards and SSN production and availability. I don't know this to be true, but I suspect it is.
I’d love to know what you think about the suitability of nuclear powered attack submarines for Canada. It seems we can’t really control our own waters year-round without them.
Eh? There's nothing that offers more strategic naval flexibility than a nuclear powered submarine. The ability to transit at 30+kts means that a boat can leave its base in Perth and be on station in SE Asia there in three days, not fifteen. From there a conventional sub can stay on station for a couple of weeks at best, the nuclear boat can be there for up to three months . The step-up in capability on these points alone, disregarding manifold other tactical and strategic advantages, should be readily apparent.
I’m sure the discussions around Virginia Class Submarines and the construction of them for the AUKUS deal would have been a little deeper than you suggest. Australia also committed substantial funds for dockyard expansion in order to facilitate these extra boats. Does it mean it will happen smoothly, or even happen at all? Definitely on the wrong side of history with that argument so time will tell. At some point Australia was going to have to bite the bullet and suck up a long lead time in order to get Nuke boats. Is it smart to do that now based on Chinas immense and unprecedented Naval expansion and military build up? I wouldn’t have thought so. Surely purchasing 6 to 8 Virginia class boats would have been waaaaaaay less risky, first of class is always a massive challenge in both delivery and commissioning and that’s providing the design is both sound and mature. Using unproven tech is fraught with danger at every corner, those types of undertakings are best left to countries like the US that can actually afford the cost blow outs and emerging tech. The other elephant in the room is the giant capability gap. Although our Collins class boats are a living nightmare for the PLA’s surface fleet, quite simply we don’t have enough of them. Even worse their operational availability is dangerously skinny. We may have 6, but there is never a day where we could see even 3 Boats at sea at the same time. 4 Virginia class boats for each coast and a smaller surface fleet is a much smarter (and safer) option I reckon. Subs are unrivalled when it comes to force multipliers. They don’t require 180+ sailors to man like skimmers do and their lethality is far superior to any warship at sea. We need Nuke Subs, but waiting until the 2040’s before we see our own is crazy. Why wouldn’t you piggy back the lessons the US has already learned when it comes to Nuclear powered stink boats and just buy them. The US needs Australia to have this capability, maybe they need to be leaned on harder from our diplomats to remind them!
It is very rare that there is a comment this long that I agree with everything on xD. > They don’t require 180+ sailors to man like skimmers do In fairness the Caberra and Hobart classes are quite a bit more multi-role than anti-ship > Although our Collins class boats are a living nightmare for the PLA’s surface fleet I think that this is true where we can credibly project them. I think unwritten in your comment is we need to go nuclear for us to routinely project the subs out to the SCS (or atleast the passages through indonesia), which seems like it would be a slow and uncommon exercise with the existing collins fleet (and likely a similar issue with the barracudas). I think the main criticisms of going with the virginias is how long we are going to have to sweat with the collins as they are, the TCO and the concern about underwater drone/autonomous mine advancement making them obsolete remain, but agree with your contention that there isn't really a better option
@ damn, here I was looking for an argument. 😂 Appreciate the response. In regards to your comments, yes I am very aware of both the Hobart and Canberra class vessels capabilities but equally aware of their deficiencies. Our AWD’s are phenomenal vessels with immense capability, but have far too few VLS to be able to stay in the fight for more than a few high impact engagements. Their subsurface capabilities are very impressive with CAPTAS 3 and obviously Seahawks with Dipping sonar/sonobouys but still don’t hold a candle to a Submarines passive capability so really the only thing our AWD’s can do that a Submarine cannot is air warfare. We could use our Air Force to act as the deterrent, along with Global Hawk armed surveillance and other automated systems, including the unmanned/minimal crewed vessels we have on order. Let them be the floating missile batteries they were designed to do. Other than the physical presence of an AWD, those vessels could be replaced (more like kept in service but not expand the surface fleet) and the funds directed to more Subs and more autonomous vessels in the air, surface and below the surface. Yes the inference regarding Nuke boats was their ability to get to the AO fast, but more so to remain on station for longer than any other capability we have now and faster. With their ability to remain undetected, any vessel from China or other unfriendly would have serious reservations (or a death wish) about wandering in to waters bringing hostile intent. Area denial is king when it comes to sovereign territory and sea lane protection, nothing new there but the disparity between say an AWD versus a Nuke Attack class boat is shall we say, “rather large!” I can say with great certainty that I know which platform I’d choose if I was going to sea in a brewing conflict! Survivability in high intensity war at sea is measured in hours on surface ships, on Submarines it’s measured in months. It’s not that hard to understand that we would lose our capital front line assets very fast if shit went down hill with little warning, history tells us that’s how it would play out, or even perhaps a false flag operation? China has proven to play by those types of rules in the minor skirmishes that our ADF and other countries have seen first hand already, CCP just loves to have the ability to ‘save face’ or look like they are the ones being stomped. 🥱 Underestimating the lethality and force projection Nuke Attack class boats offer has been the Australian government way for many years, fortunately that is changing but I personally feel it’s still not fully understood by those who should know better in Government and Defence decision making. For sure, we need a surface fleet, but the current plan I feel is far too top heavy with GP Frigates and the new Hunter class/type 26. It’s already an under-capable ship, not a single one still hasn’t been completed by the UK nor has any of the combat systems or propulsion been tested. How can we be not nervous about that? As we know, Collins class Subs were an absolute nightmare for years, it wasn’t until Defence decided to kick emerging tech to the curb and go back to mature systems did we start to see those Boats in service. The Type 26 are way behind in the UK, they are expensive as hell, are too heavy and not fast enough. The Hunter needs 96+ VLS to be a serious threat, they are manpower hungry and they are unproven. We know how that combination has gone for us in the past, but even worse is they can’t stay in the fight for long which then puts our auxiliary ships in harms way in order to keep the Hunters at sea. Obviously Nuke Subs only come home when they are out of food or weapons. Another giant elephant in the room is recruitment and retention. Quite simply Australia’s current young generations are not interested in serving our country. They have seen how we treat our returned heroes, they have seen the Woke BS that the ADF has adopted and they have seen the DEI rot go through the ADF like wildfire. Angus Campbell has done a mighty 👎 job there and it’s not going to be fixed any time soon. The Navy struggles to man the vessels we have now so how do they think they are going to man 6 new ASW FFG’s and 11 new GP Frigates? Plus the Subs? I guess it’s easy for us to rock back in our chairs and say the Government is doing it all wrong. In the Navy’s instance, I genuinely feel they are but it’s just my opinion. Having 8 Nuke boats, 4 East and 4 West, along with 3 conventional Subs (off the shelf evolved type 209’s or similar) each for East and West that cover our littoral waters would be phenomenally lethal, deterrence scale would be off the charts! 3 x AWD’s and maybe a couple of GP Frigates and Australia becomes a country that is protected by real teeth. Her sea lanes and interests are protected, has its coastlines protected far greater than any current plan we are currently invested in. Army takes up the task PROPERLY of Anti Ship missile defence with coastal batteries of JSM/NSM/PrSM both in fixed and mobile launch sites spread strategically throughout the North, our Mine hunters looking after the new smart mines we have procured and all of a sudden our strategic position and defence of our great nation looks a whole lot more robust, functional and most importantly actually achievable. Yes, I know. I am living in a dreamland but as they say, nothing wrong with dreaming. Whilst I am at it, may as well throw a couple of squadrons of B21 Raiders in the mix to give those who have big eyes on “The great Southern resource” something else to think about eh? 😜
Aussie here... Glad to listen to an intelligent and level headed analysis of our overall military projection into the 2040s. I may be wrong, but I think you missed the US$ two billion we are investing in increasing sub shipyard infrastructure in America to increase build capability? Also, what do you think about long range aerial and subsurface attack drone capability being developed in the mean time, as the AUKUS subs won't be ready until the 40s (all going well unlike the Collins Class debacle!)? Surely drones of all types would be cheaper, faster to produce and could be produced in large enough numbers in a few years? China's Navy is already vastly larger than Australia's and so I doubt they will wait until we are properly prepared before they attempt to dominate our region of Oceania. What do you think?
We could have bought 3 more LHDs (1 extra amphibious assault to maintain operational reliability of the fleet, 1 very light aircraft carrier + long-range drones, 1 air-training carrier but also deployable) and 4-6 Arleigh-Burkes and a few oilers, for less than our current naval outlook procurement. And had better detection, anti-air, anti-submarine, patrol range, and to-shore strike range compared to anything the Navy has plans to do. Up to and including 2043. We'd probably have enough money left for "some reasonable submarines", as long as we didn't get screwed on the deals. And enough left over for the Army to get their stuff too.
Interesting that you spent so little time on the RAAF. The model the RAAF followed should be seen as a blueprint for western militaries to prepare and for lack of a better term "rearm". The RAAF signed up as one of the original partners of the F35 program and there was enough lead in the F35 program that if there were delays, there would still be enough of the F35 force present to allow the F-18A's to retire. The biggest mistake the RAAF made during this time was retiring the F111 without an adequate replacement, however the F18E/F Super Hornet was quickly acquired. The RAAF then had a missing capacity in frontline electronic warfare. The RAAF invested in and spearheaded the development of the Wedgetail, and also added to the Super Hornet order the E18 Growlers. The RAAF made the decision to jump in on the last production run of the C17 globemaster and has now 5 (or 6?) in service. The RAAF could have bought another 6 easily as these aircraft are constantly being utilised and are rarely still. The RAAF also ensured that their assets had capability to hit far and wide replacing the ancient 707's with the KC30 aerial refuelling platform. The RAAF then procured the C27 Spartan, though I'm not sure why. There was no coordination with the Army on this, as Spartans cannot transport Bushmasters or the proposed Hawkei, they are essential for very light troop transport. The RAAF's sea patrol capability was now getting long in the tooth and the RAAF procured P8 Poseidon and the Triton drone. The RAAF is also in development of the MQ28 Ghost Bat, a loyal wingman drone. This was selected over the proposed 5th F35 squadron which would have delivered Australia 100 F35's. If successful, the RAAF would then likely go down the path of procurement of one of the largest loyal wingman drone fleets. The advantage of this is that you aren't using your piloted and highly lethal aircraft to babysit other assets. Before we finish with RAAF procurement, the RAAF also showed interest in the B21 program before pivoting to the AUKUS Nuclear Sub program. The RAAF has really been the big winner over the last 20 years out of the 3 service branches and is, frankly, the only service near ready to fight a kinetic war envisaged in the defence strategic review today. The RAAF is now at a point where it needs to either deliver a fleet of loyal Wingman drones (I would hope somewhere in the hundreds) or look to it's next major development and potential F35 replacement, or risk finding itself in 20 to 30 years where the Navy is now. Note that this comment started with entry by the RAAF in F35 program back in the mid-2000s, and only now in December 2025 has the last F35 entered service, the RAAF received all it's Super Hornets, Growlers, KC30's, E7 Wedgetails, C17's, P8's, C27's and everything else, however this took (including R&D) 20 years to get to where we are today. Sorry for the long comment, but I believe a case study should be done on the RAAF to examine how it successfully delivered what was effectively a 20 year modernisation plan so successfully.
You kind of glossed over a few things, like our LHDs, and the Army buying AH-64Es. You also kind of skipped over the RAAF, which is very well equipped, with E-7 AWACS, the same things that the US and NATO are buying, but Australia was first to operate them, as well as the RAAF aerial tanker force of KC-330MRTT aircraft. As well as the only operator of the EF-18G Growler EW Aircraft, outside the US. We also operate Triton UAVs and have developed the JORN radar network.
To play devil's advocate, he probably didn't cover them because to my knowledge they aren't actually covered in the white papers, and therefore probably doesn't even know about them.
Michael, Thank you for such an interesting video. As and Australian I might be able to fill in some of the details that effect the way we approach national defence. Australia was founded as a British colony in 1788 half way around the world from the mother country. Initial settlement by approx. 1,400 people was around Sydney. Our population grew and spread quite slowly. Our current population is 27.5 million with a land area of just under 3 million square miles and a shore line of nearly 26,000 km. Despite being a “settler society” an Australian ethos has remained since the time of first British settlement. That ethos is of an insecure people who have always been dependent on a “big brother” for protection. Up until WW2 we were dependent on Britain. With the fall of Singapore in February 1942 we changed allegiance to the United States and have been under it’s wing ever since. There is no concept of belief that we could be neutral and/or defend ourselves like many countries much smaller than us do. Our economy is dominated by mining and agriculture. Back in the 1970’s we gave up any pretence of having a significant manufacturing sector - rational economics prevailed. This background helps explain our participation in most of America’s wars since the end of WW2. You mentioned our passion for building submarines in Adelaide (look at the map to see how far away it is from the major centres of population). After WW2 the South Australian and Commonwealth governments encouraged manufacturing industries to be established around Adelaide. This was to be a soak for the large number of migrants coming into Australia after WW2. In particular General Motors was persuaded/bribed to build a large car making plant where they made Holdens. During the 2000’s economics finally caught up and the GM plant closed creating a great deal of unemployment. So what did the two governments do to fix that? They established a ship building industry for war ships and the Collins class submarine. South Australia is very important to both major political parties at election time; neither is prepared to risk loosing votes by not having lots of navel ships and boats to build in Adelaide - no matter the cost to the rest of us. So you can understand why the French, the Japanese, the Koreans and now the Americans and British have to build nuclear submarines in Adelaide. I should add that we have only one very small nuclear reactor that is used to produce isotopes for medical purposes. We have NO nuclear industry - NONE!!! So to two issues you raised: First: Tha Abrahams tanks. Our current military doctrine as you accurately described is aimed at the islands to our north and east. Again I ask you to look at travel documentaries of any place inside our area of military interest. Then see how you would operate an Abrahams tank in the jungles of those places. It’s just ludicrous that military planners could think that was a good idea. Second: AUKUS! Our GDP is AUD1.8 trillion. AUKUS will cost us AUD375 billion. The cost alone is astronomical. The 12 French submarines had a price tag of AUD90 billion - about a quarter of the cost. If we needed long-range submarines we were offered an excellent boat from Japan (I think we declined it because Naval command thought all the controls would have Japanese writing on them :-( ). The AUKUS deal was developed by a small group of Australian naval officers and three former US Navy admirals who were working as contractors for the Defence Department in Canberra. The sweetener for the US was the billions of dollars we are required to pump into US shipyards to help them up the Virginia production rate. Australian money going to boost American shipyards!!! As for the actual British/Australian built boats; they will simply never happen. Britain (unlike Australia) can’t afford them. I better end now, this has been quite a ramble but I hope it helps. Regards, Peter
Thanks! Yeah, I'm skeptical AUKUS boats will happen. I've also heard mixed things about why AUS didn't go for the Japanese boats, including lingering anti-Japanese sentiment. AUKUS just sounds like a bad idea, and I believe it stems from some combination of US/UK diplomats making promises they couldn't keep and AUS people engaged in wishful thinking.
The cost comparison between the sub programs is wrong. You are comparing lifetime Aukus cost versus build cost of the Naval Group subs. The Aukus estimate is A$268bn, including two new bases and the Virginias. The lifetime cost of the NG subs was A$240bn. Not such a big difference. The Aukus estimate also had an extra $100bn thrown in as contingency, for a media headline total of A$368bn, just to toss fodder to critics for some reason. Pretending to predict the future is a mug's game. Defence programs like this are always bespoke and difficult. But the two parties of government representing 88% of Australians are behind the Aukus program. It has momentum, treaties and contracts behind it. Put it in context as well. It is not a huge program by the standards of bigger powers. The UK just paid A$1.2tr as the first tranch of a third of the cost of the joint fighter program with Japan and Italy. Aukus is loose change in comparison.
Peter, reasonable summary. A few insights: I don't interpret the early history of Australia as one of an insecure people dependent on a “big brother” for protection. Particularly in the Boer War and WW1, patriotism towards England was the main driver of our involvement. In WW2 Australia was in the war well before Japan's involvement and the pivot towards America only occurred after Japanese attacks threatened Australia. Australia does not require an nuclear industry to have nuclear submarines or ships as the fuel can be provided from the US or Europe. Adelaide is a major city and the capital city of South Australia. It is not "away from the major centres of population". Adelaide has a decades long history of ship and submarine building and has shipbuilding infrastructure in place. Ships are being built there as we speak. Australia had very effectively operated tanks in jungle from the second world war to Vietnam. Students of Australian Military history will be aware that Australia pioneered tank/infantry jungle tactics. When used correctly, tanks are extraordinarily effective. It's a common thing for countries to use foreign investment in the development of technology. Australia did it with the F35 and as a result got them earlier and cheaper than most other US partners. The investment in the US shipyard will see at least on, and likely several, second hand nuclear subs transferred to the RAN years earlier than we could hope to build them ourselves. It is important to note that the next generation submarine that Australia will build has not yet been designed and will be a collaborative project between the UK, US and Australia. The UK does not have to build them for themselves for Australia to build them, although it is most likely that they will rely on UK components. Other than that nit picking, good comment Peter.
Re the AUKUS class, Britain can afford to build them. Their GDP is 4.7 trillion and their defence budget is around 95 billion. They aren't starting from scratch either, they have a world class sub building industry in place.
@@michaelshurkin613 At the time the AUKUS decision was made we had the worst Prime Minister Australia has ever had - Scott Morrison (ScoMo to his friends and enemies). The whole thing was an ego trip. Several months later we kicked him out and replaced the Liberal-National coalition (right-wing conservative) with Labor (centre-progressive - though in hindsight that should be regressive). ScoMo is lucky that he is not doing jail time. But he gave the then Labor opposition 12 hours to agree with AUKUS and only two Labor politicians were allowed to know about it. That Labor agreed is an ongoing shame on them, but they are frightened to be painted as weak on defence.
Agree with your assessment of the air force and army. I just hope the ADF can manage the assets to get them where they are needed when they are needed; this is not easy given the distances we have to cope with. The purchase of additional landing craft may assist this. The Navy is critical and being grossly mismanaged by both the Government & ADF at the moment, with purchasing being political not strategic. We have to stop pay way too much for our ships and we have to put more guns and missiles on them; they like to buy a good design them remove almost everything that can shoot. CIWS's are paramount to protect against asymmetrical attacks like drones and small fast boats and not need to fire a $1million missile. None of the RAN ships currently have sufficient CIWS's. They also have to stop demanding massive changes to proven designs, this is what makes our ship so expensive.
For Australia, it really is all about navy(including submarines), marines and Air force on my mind. On other hand for regular troops they really only need capacity to conscript, arm and train them in case of great need, or few they can use overseas or rapid response. After all, Australia has a lot of buffer between them and realistic adversary. And even though there are countries nearby, at least as far as I know, they are not really considered that much of an threat. Australia really just needs to use navy and air force to keep any enemy as far as possible for as long as possible. By offensive and defensive means. Maybe they could also field small fast response land army, and stuff like self propelled land and air missile platforms. Though I guess even those could just mostly be held in reserve, land based missile platforms, and scale personnel up in case of great defensive need. After all you have navy and air force. And those would really only be needed on scale when actual mainland needs to be defended, meaning conscription anyways. Overall, my conclusion would be that they need to be able to project power for defense via navy, with light mechanized marines/troops that can bother aggressors as far as possible from homeland, or support allies. Then missile defense inside the country for land, air and sea, and I would say some small coastal craft. And ofc air force. Like said in video, I think tanks are kinda useless too, well, money not optimally spent. And yeah, they should just have doubled down on infantry fighting vehicle instead, it's necessary for any troop transport operation where enemy fire is expected, and it can be transported much easier to far off places. And unlike tanks, these are actually necessary, so having more of them in case of war is very useful.
We're not conscripting to fight some war the Yanks the start. You overthrew our government once before because of that; we're not giving you the chance again. Pretty much all of the drama we're facing is due to our (forced) alliance with America, a country, as this video says, is only allied with Australia so as to prevent a war reaching the redhats and rednecks in the US for ever actually feeling the effects of it while cheering it on.
@@michaelshurkin613 I would love to see your take on this, i'd say its a topic that is video worthy. I saw a few videos from the YT channel "Kamome" and "Task & Purpose" regarding Indonesia as a potential front for a Cold War 2.0 if the south china sea would blow over. More perspectives on this would be gold. Appreciate it man, thanks from across the sea!
One very small point to this podcast that rankled is the misspelling of 'defence' in the Australian context. It's the Australian Defence Force and Australian Defence Policy.etc. If you can't get this small detail right then one may question what other mistakes there are.
Historically these are unchartered waters for Australia. The forward defence of Australia was by the British Far East Fleet based in Singapore then then the 7tb Fleet out of Subic then no threat with the collapsed of the Soviet Union. It is very expensive to defend Australia at long range as that means larger ships and submarines which costs a lot more credible cheaper options like La Fayatte class frigates and Type 214 subs operational range were too short from Darwin. However decades ago Australia signed an ancient treaty called the Five power defense arrangement which gave them rights to rotate forces out of Butterworth airbase in Malaysia (RAAF used to station Horbets there) snd the British Defense Support Unit at Sembawang Singapore ( the british maintain a couple of OPV there). I don't think Singapore mind a much heavier RAN presence there with destroyers and frigates since Singapore need Australia's Shoalwater Bay Training too
Do u mean basing RAN ships in Singapore? If so then that's very unlikely as it might change Singapore's geopolitical perception in the region... unless Singapore is in real danger of a military conflict n thus having allied presence around helps prevent that from happening. 😂
While the intention of FPDA was for the protection of Singapore and Malaysia, it now seems like a bad joke for the former in terms of cf avaliable military deterrence capbility. Nevertheless FPDA do allow the basing of military forces in Malaysia & Singapore. RAAF still maintain a logistic unit and rifle company at butterworth meaning they will hardly object and probably welcome increase RAAF prescence, the defense support unit at sembawang is always avaliable to RN or any commonwealth task force of RAN if any is formed. Bases are such a dirty word these days...the US do not have bases in the northern territory they just rotate a lot out of Robertson and tindal
I would also suggest we need an airborne battalion with supporting medical, engineer and artillery forces as we had in 3RAR airborne battle group. This gave Australia a rapidly deployable force able to be sent anywhere on the continent or the region within 24 hours. We have lost this capability.
We aren't getting those Virginia's. The US isn't going to give us Virginia's while they still have LA class and aren't building that many. Secondly and this is the most important thing. We don't have the ability to crew a virginia class. We can barely crew our collins class subs that only require 42-58 personnel and so how are we going to be able to crew a sub that requires 135 to operate?
While I'm not going to disagree with the major thrust of this, I will point out that a large part of the decisions are to have sovereign and local manufacture of armour, fires, ammunition, vehicles, ships, boats and missiles. It has not just been about the acquisition.... this Labor government has been the most proactive defence-focused government in 40 years!
Ironic that more often than not the party currently other side of the chamber likes to profess it is the one that takes defence seriously etc. The current government seems to have taken much of the DSR recommendations and decided to implement them. It will be interesting to see what becomes of the new fires brigade, the general purpose frigates and unmanned teaming for the RAAF.
Hello from an Australian, My thoughts. After 1945 we should have just been a neutral country, we didn't need to fight in Korea, Vietnam, The Gulf, Iraq, Afghanistan. The Australian government should have built large naval/airforce bases in the Solomon Islands and the north coast of Papua New Guinea, as well as naval/airforce bases with Israeli style dome defence systems in Darwin, Townsville and Broome. Adelaide could have been the nations defence ship building Mecca. Australia's motto would be, " we aren't going to attack you, but if you ever think about attacking us..., think again"
Thank you Sir! Another excellent video where there was a lot to learn! When looking at Australia being primarily a Naval-based force (and force projection), and given the recent development in Naval warfare (the case of the debacle of the ru Black Sea Fleet being a prime example), to me it screams Multi-role support ships / Ocean capable Drone Carriers as a way to help counter-balance the Asia-Pacific "heavy threats". This especially given the fact that Australia would not get involved in a kinetic war without (primarily) the USA and its regional partners. As for the whole Australian decision to renege on the French submarine deal, don't get me started! :-) My best guess is this has more to do with Australia's political transition at the time where the US took advantage of the populism "nouvelle vague" in the country at the time, and not a rational decision per say. After all, as Mr. Macron explained when that was announced, "France would have been more than happy to change the contract and offer nuclear subs". Which reminds me that I havent yet watched last week's video! Thanks again!
Thank you. I don't think the full story is known: Yes, there was a political transition, but who started the conversation? Did the US say to the Australians, "Psst...I have an idea..." Or did the AUS side start the convo? What was the UK role?
@@michaelshurkin613 true! Who knows! Talks about subs are usually like... subs! 🙂 Nonetheless it's going to be an expensive few subs in... 15 years from now for Australia! May we remind everyone that you don't jump from a no sub shipyard country to nuclear sub shipyard country in a decade... Nahhh, I think that my point about the Drones Carriers is going to have more pull in the foreseeable future because of costs and capacities.
Australia should have bought the stock standard French nuclear subs back in 2010 and we would likely have 2 in the water by now and 2 more well into construction. The first AUKUS sub will likely not be delivered until the mid 2040's, if ever (the ADF will probably change their minds AGAIN), which is absurd. Why make an agreement for something you have no reasonable capacity to deliver.
Bad research mate, Britain more or less abandoned Australia and had a Europe first policy in WW2. Even India was seen as more strategic and Britain said we can always retake Australia and Pacific after. After many arguments between Australian PM Curtin and Churchill Australia 7th and 9th Divisions were able to return to Australia from Africa, but Australia 6th Division had to stay. As Australian troops were returning to fight Japanese Churchill then redirected the Australian troops to Burma and then again arguments erupted from Australia PM Curtin and Churchill gave in, only issue now was the Australian troops recieved no security ships to defend them if attacked on the journey.. This is when Australia turned to USA for protection..
For me the biggest strange thing about the Australian Army is this; if it's been modelled somewhat around the USMC and is expected to be able to 'island hop' the Pacific in conjunction with the Navy, then it makes little sense to not invest into modern Light Tanks like the Booker M10 MPF or Light tank BAE. Surely being able to provide armoured support to landing operations would surely be more useful in a sense to the M1A2 Abrams (although I'm sure they will be good for Mainland support). You do touch upon this, but I think that the defensive ability for the tank should not be ignored for mainland and I suppose the occasional forward deployment via Hercules perhaps. I do think 75 is way too low though, given the tank churn in Ukraine, even if it can be argued that the Russian's aren't supporting their tanks nearly enough. But if they are looking to increase fires, the cutting of the Huntsman self-propelled howitzer is a mistake. Even if they have to just sit on the deck of the LHD's, it can provide excellent support to island hopping. The order cut for the Redback I think is short sighted as well, Australia's APC's are the well obsolete Vietnam things, even though we have various Bushmasters, and Strykers. As for the RAAF, I think if we are getting nuclear subs, we should invest in B-21 Raiders as well, even conventionally armed we could use them to clear out advanced fighter screens and destroy targets from BVR. I get the feeling that the authors of the relative defense papers were putting all their eggs into the Ghost Bat program. The F-35 order should not have been cut to 75 aircraft, as the RAAF originally pegged that 100 would be necessary for the protection of Australia.
You realise that 450 IFV was predicated on the idea that we would use them on the Australian mainland, right? Think about that for a second. It's a ridiculous concept.
@@tigerpjm I do agree, but I think the 120 or so we do have on order seems a bit low considering: a) they will still need to be used on the Australian mainland, b) island hopping and deployments and presumably c) will have to have enough to perform both ideally. So 450 does seem absurd for numbers (although, I think they are trying to increase the size of the army to be 100,000+?) but what we will be getting seems so low given Ukraine tank and APC churn (even if we were to assume that we'd protect our's much better). Losses will happen.
@OniFeez So if we're not going to fight an enemy on the mainland because it's, like, a really silly idea, how are we going to get all these IFVs to where we're fighting? A C-17 can carry 3 at a time... The Ukraine comparison is utterly irrelevant to our strategic situation. Who are we proposing to fight massive tank battles with across open terrain? Australia uses armour to support infantry.
We will have the redback IFV and the Boxer recon vehicles, we don't need light tanks. The LHD's,and the medium/heavy landing craft being built can transport the Abrams just as easily. Also you cant forward deploy an M1A2 in a Hercules, they have to be moved in a C-17.
Your mistaken about a lot of this or you've misrepresented your understanding poorly. I'm an Australian and I'll try to amend your comments as best as I can remember the points as there are so many. First off, fundamentally there are 5 branches of the modern day Australian Defence Force (ADF). There is army, navy, air force, cyber and space. Well over 95% of international trade for Australia comes via the oceans but for the sake of fuel /time costs etc which are directly related to the nation's cost of living, the trade routes mean that control of a few key choke points are key. We don't have to secure all of the oceans around us, just the important navigation routes. It's not just commercial shipping, as you've correctly stated, we're a long way from anywhere, which also means that no country is a serious invasion threat so long as these key points are at the most kept secure, or at the least, kept in check. The sheer distance alone means that any peer nations world have to commit to a one way trip as they are at the extreme edge of their range, it'd be a one way trip as they're fuel /food etc resources wouldn't allow for a return trip. That's why Australia strives to maintain stability and prosperity for our regional neighbouring countries. The reason why we wanted a domestic submarines building capacity was from the lessons learnt with our Oberon class submarines where essentially, almost an entire third of their life was spent traversing across the oceans to their nation of origin for & including servicing /downtime requirements instead of being on station, doing the job. 96% of our data is handled by undersea cables in the waters to our north. Australia does have a sound understanding of nuclear technologies, we've had a nuclear reactor providing electrical power generation since 1958 with the Lucas's Heights reactor, the majority of the population has simply been against it because not able to effectively neutralise the radioactive waste and the inherent dangers associated with the technology as illustrated by Chernobyl, Fukishima and the USA's reactors fears from both the St Helens volcano and the incident's around Three Mile Island reactor etc. As far as the weaponising of nuclear technology we are signatories to the anti nuclear proliferating pact. Summing up this stance is that we haven't developed the infrastructure required for large scale nuclear operations or refinement. There is a lot more I could say but this comment is long enough as it is.
>Well over 95% of international trade for Australia comes via the oceans but for the sake of fuel /time costs etc Probably important to highlight that you can't really use that to "siege" (unless you are simultaneously attriting RAAF/RAAN/PGM) given that we are net exporter of food, energy and raw materials > The sheer distance alone means that any peer nations world have to commit to a one way trip as they are at the extreme edge of their range Also something that I don't think is appreciated is that unless you're landing at basically Darwin or Broome you have to do that distance again but over land to get to anywhere of value over impassable terrain for any sizable forces -- the outback will probably kill you before you get to any population centres. >96% of our data is handled by undersea cables in the waters to our north. I'm not sure how you are calculating this, but this is almost certainly overstated. I find it incredible to believe that Southern Cross is less than 4%, which is one of several that run out via nz/fiji/haiwaii (ie: east not through the north). It's probably important to note that something like 75% of the capacity going north is going via Guam (major US military presence), so we very likely have some shared US interest in defending that specific passage. >we've had a nuclear reactor providing electrical power generation since 1958 with the Lucas's Heights reactor This is very misleading, Lucas Heights is a research reactor not for electrical power production. Running a research reactor (I doubt there are any people involved in the design/build process left) vs building and using it for electrical generation in a boat along with differences along with reactor types (OPAL vs PWR) make it incredibly unlikely that the skills or processes are remotely as transferrable as you are indicating (and again... 1 team vs building out and operating a dozen boats). I would wager that the those who prepared the report have a deeper insight than you.
@@tomtech1537I absolutely agree with you on most points, the others really are not a case of black or white disagreement but ones of degree's of difference.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Flux_Australian_Reactor Lucas Heights has never been a power producing site it’s pure research/medical isotopes, that said your comment stands and the knowledge base is definitely there
then australia should have chosen french nuclear submarines. Their technology uses nuclear fuel equivalent to that used in nuclear power plants. You have to refuel more often than with American technology ( but that's still counted in years), but it's a process that Australia could have mastered completely.
Australia has a very limited ship/submarine building capacity…quite simply buy them off the self and stop trying to redesign/redevelop/reengineer. The cost blow outs and the time it takes… Our government has finally begun to simplify the process by considering buying new frigates from (2nd Tier…not Hunter Class) or at least the first few…off the shelf. Where are we going to get the bodies to man these platforms is another question. Defence Recruiting had been in decline for a long time.
My understanding is why Australia went with the nuclear submarines was the charge in the United States Government and the Biden Government was the one who pushed the Australian Government to go nuclear. However, if you are been paying attention, the builder of nuclear submarines in the USA has been saying that it is not possible for the USA to build any submarines for Australian, but the United Kingdom is desperate for work for their ship building yards. So my guess is the submarines will be British with some USA technology or Australia will go back to the French. You also need to remember that the available conventional submarines are too small for Australian use and this is why Australia can’t just buy a submarine off the shelf. Australia is surrounded by the largest oceans in the world and the Collin class submarine is a large conventional submarine.
Ditching the military grade satalite program is incredibly stupid…..as for corvettes why when you need a proper navy proper very sea worthy vessel like the hunter class
What is also incredibly stupid is the widespread reporting that jp9102 has been cancelled when it has not, and that is straight from senate estimates. They are looking at using a system that has satelites at different levels of orbit. There has also never been a suggestion of Australia using corvettes unless you would call the off shore patroll vessel a corvette. Possible you could look at the Australian general purpose frigate wikipedia page.
I am not expert but ADF plan purchases with Army n Airforce seem reasonable but more IVF n boxers are needed like Bushmasters more were originally were produced to keep up with demand. Navy has opportunity to be great navy but needs learn from history like Seasprite, failed bid of OPC n manufacturing in Australia. Submarines should been improved Collins, 6 to 8 not 12 as crew issues. Although if this wasnt possible then Japanese diesel Submarines. Then we could gone French Nuclear Submarines or AUKUS Submarines. Surface Fleet number? I say if Australian manufacturer can produce 1 warship every 2 years then 6 is answer, so this means 12 are built over 20 years. So when Hobart DDG was built there should been 2 improved batch. 6 Hunter frigates would next followed by improved 6 Hunter DDG to replace earlier Hobarts. 12 Surface fleet all the time, adding 6 VLS warships unmanned would help at sea but problem coastal environments. Forget light frigates n patrol boats go Transfield OPC warship although bigger flight deck/hanger to handled Seahawk very similar Canada Halifax but 24 VLS but fitted short range hellfire missiles for drone boat n aircraft attack. The OPC would cover coastal areas better then large DDG. While unmanned VLS warships are wanted unmanned PT boats like in WW2 is needed fight undersurface subs
Yes the submarines will be expensive. However they will be effective and good value for money. Australia is rich enough to afford them. Second the idea is to build up our own technological and industrial base . This applies not only to the subs but missile and munitions manufacture, and air and sea unmanned drones like the loyal wingman. Finally, demographics is an issue. However, Australia has recently greatly increased its immigration intake. This should provide more potential service men and women. Plus school and university courses are being introduced to funnel trained technicians etc into the armed forces. The problem is time The Chinese threat will be greatest in the next 5 to 10 years. Much of the naval capability won't be acquired until after that time frame and indeed our navy will grow smaller before it grows bigger.
Michael is certainly Francophile and it shows here. Discussing the submarine ‘gap’ ‘created’ by choosing AUKUS but completely forgetting a key decision maker being the colossal delays and frustrations mounting with the French sub designs
That's fair. Though that came from the decision to.modify the Suffren and shift manufacturing to AUS. ...of course, perhaps the French shouldn't have offered the modified Suffren. It seems they underestimated the difficulty of the conversion
You are forgetting the geography part of this. Australia and its bases is very far away the southern and east China seas. The conventional powered subs would have between 7-12 days on patrol by some reports I have seen Where as nuclear subs would have a hell of a lot longer
The 'colossal delays' and 'frustrations' were manufactured excuses to throw to the media and try to cover up Australian government incompetence in the handling of the subs deal from the very start.
@michaelshurkin613 yes like macron misleading a cock head like Malcolm turnbull, Australia's pm at the time, Scott Morrison being the treasurer. Australian tax payers lost billions with these two in government.
Australia’s official report stated that the French design met all previous requirements and was on track in the project process. They nevertheless chose to end the project at that milestone instead of extending it. This was not due to any deficiencies or delays or even the cost overruns but simply because the geopolitical situation had changed and the strategic need for nuclear propulsion was determined to be important enough to justify an immediate change in procurement plans. France has a nuclear powered version of course but this was immediately seen as unsuitable for Australia’s needs because it uses LEU fuel that requires refueling several times during its lifetime and Australia has no facilities or expertise for conducting those refuelings in Australia. They would have had to have made trips to France for the refueling which was seem as a strategic vulnerability. The Virginias and future AUKUS submarines will not require refueling because of the reactor design and fuel used. France could build subs that require less frequent or no refueling but this would require new reactors and different fuel at much higher enrichment, either HALEU or HEU. France has chosen to share their civilian and military fuel together which limits them to LEU or HALEU and so far they still use only LEU.
Again as a regular Australian, I've got to ask What the FARK are they thinking?! Why not just buy the subs, I understand providing jobs to our people but at such a HUGE percent of our defence budget?!
Do you mean why not just buy the AUKUS subs (or Virginia-class) and have them made overseas or just stick with the French Diesel electric subs? The second is a no brainer, diesel electric boats have enormous capability deficits vs. nuclear-powered. One can go months submerged at full speed (they only need to surface when they run out of food) and decades without refuelling, the other has to surface every few days, travels at reduced speed to conserve power (not very stealthy) and needs forward bases to refuel, as their submerged range is quite poor. There's a reason the French Navy don't actually use them themselves. To the former, the cost of buying an AUKUS sub or Virginia class isn't going to be materially less than the cost of building them in Australia so why not do so?
Yeah, honestly I don't see Australia being able to keep up a robust nuclear submarine program on its own in the future so this might end up just being a continual cash sink churning out subpar results with more and more compromises to make things work - unless they somehow manage to port over an entire supply chain and body of institutional knowledge then maintain the procurement funnel.
Australia is a somewhat growing upper-medium level regional superpower as the main solid land mass, and is generally growing while the UK and other European powers have continued a slow process of decline.
Australia is not even a medium size power. With a population about 25m no Aircraft carrier fixed wing capable. Your defence is totally reliance on the US. You don’t have the military industrial base like the U.K. or French.
I think previous and current governments don’t really know if China is a threat, and what type of threat. Grey zone conflict, large scale peer on peer conflict or all talk but ultimately no threat at all. That said, the continual ship building is an obvious concern for the future. Our government responded by building 9, now 6, frigates that have the capability of detecting a Russian or American submarine (not a Chinese submarine) at a cost of $45B. They also want 8 SSN’s at a cost of $368B. How about we don’t waste $413B on these 2 platforms and instead invest in; 50 Mogami frigates that can perform air, surface, submarine and MCM…~$25B 100 LUSV (2 for each Mogami) to extend their total VLS to 96….~$25B 200 super ghost bat drones but B1B size with range and payload to threaten Beijing…..~$10B, but can also perform maritime strike. 500 Ghost shark XLUUV……$11.5B Total cost ~$71.5B, a larger more lethal force at a cost saving of ~$341.5B, total frontline 4500 personnel.
Can you explain why Hunter Class frigates won't be able to detect Chinese submarines? Also, your numbers in relation to Mogami frigates are highly fanciful. You don't just pay for a warship and then have it like you do with a jet-ski. It requires constant upkeep which costs a lot of money.
@@tigerpjmmy point about the Hunter is that it’s a ridiculously overpowered platform for hunting the relatively noisy Chinese submarines. For a lot less money we could have many platforms that can do the same job. The previous strategy 12 Hunters & 3 Hobarts (15 ships) would have had a crew of 2700, 50 Mogami would have a crew of 4500 (50 ships).
@@tigerpjmmy point is that the Hunter class is an overpowered platform for hunting Chinese submarines. The only reason for building the Hunter is if we think we will be threatened by Russian submarines…..unlikely. With a significant number of XLUUV even Russian submarines might not be a problem. 50 Mogami’s will have a higher manpower cost if they are all crewed, but if 30 are crewed and 20 are placed into storage for wartime the crew requirement is actually the same as the previous 12 Hunter 3 Hobart strategy. The great point of LUSV and XLUUV is that you do treat them like jet ski’s, place them into storage until you need them. The benefit of a 50 boat Mogami strategy is that a large constant and highly efficient ship building industry can be put in place. If you lose one boat during a war it’s less than 2% of the fleet. The overall benefit of this strategy is we essentially get 50 overpowered Arleigh Burke destroyers at a fraction of the cost. We also get a bomber fleet, something we desperately lack after decommissioning of the F111. Platforms we can continually build here in Australia…..and more than $340B cost saving.
@@tigerpjmsorry my explanation is confusing, what I meant was it’s over qualified. A cheaper anti submarine frigate would be a more appropriate use of tax payers money. 30 Mogami frigate has the same crewing requirement as the previous 12 Hunter 3 Hobart strategy, put 20 into storage until you need them.
As part of the multidecade nuclear-powered submarine plan unveiled on Tuesday, Australian taxpayers will pour “substantial” funds into expanding American shipbuilding capacity, understood to be about $3bn in the first four years.13 Mar 2023
No, the unions aren’t ’very powerful’. They can’t force governments to do what they want. Governments have decided to build ships and other defence assets in Australia for various reasons, including their own political self-interest. Governments of both persuasions like to run on having provided or sustained jobs in electorates because they know that that gets votes or doesn’t lose them. Whether that is sound strategically is moot: sometimes it is, other times it’s not. But don’t blame unions for that. That nonsense is just typical right-wing propaganda.
Unions have nothing to do with it. It stems back to the Oberon class submarines where every single spare part and bit and bolt had to come 12,000 miles from the UK. Aust wants to be be able to service and supply its own subs with its own workforce and supply chain.
@TitouFromMars perhaps, but the French were originally given the tendered contract for the Barracuda conventionally powered submarines. This contract was cancelled because of time overruns, stage deadliness not being met and would've seen delivery at least a decade beyond due date. ua-cam.com/video/a_Y4QQ8Hm3k/v-deo.htmlsi=o7BOLQ6tPjweps7c
Britain was far from cool with us focusing on our own interests in the Pacific. When Curtin, the absolute legend, withdrew Australian forces from North Africa, Churchill tried to have the troops diverted en route to Burma to protect British interests. Churchill was not happy, although he was not in a position to do anything. Also, you're still wondering why we "chose" to side the with United States: you've overthrown our government once before - you're not as big a fan of democracy as you like to portray.
The Australian government are clueless about what submarines the country needs or requires. With Trump to come into the equation again next year, the Virginia subs might as well disappear right now. Australia has to foot any bill for the US or UK if either country withdraws from AUKUS. We would be much better off if the Australian government turned to the French and purchased the Suffren. Yes, the Suffren need refuelling. But the cost savings are there, and the ability to get these boats sooner rather than later is a major coup for the French if the Australian government would stop thinking that America would save it from any threat from China.
From the outside it looks like there would have been a opportunity to buy French nuclear subs at half the price America wants for theirs. Already now the US can't build enough for themself. They simply dont have the capacity or manpower
The Australians cut the Swedes out of the comptition for new subs (while insulting and lying about them), awarded the the Japanese but changed their minds and secretly awarded the French the contract for new subs. The Swedes and the Japanese are furious. Time passes, the Australians keep paying the French for the new designs etc but in secret they are negotiating for a new sub from the Americans/British.... The French is never told, and despite seeing this as a big expansion of the French/Australian cooperation in the Pacific they are not invited into the new cooperation between the US/UK and Australia... They are not happy. The Americans cant build submarines fast enough to satisfy their own needs and its doubtful if the Brits can build new subs. Good luck Australia LOL
A nice little video Australia should form the Australian marines for use in northern Australia and the islands with have 2 carrier no aircraft we need 24 F35b to provide fleet air cover and cover for operation in the islands scrap the Collins only one is sea worthy.
We have no carriers, we have 2 LHD's and their deck is not capable of supporting F35B's. We don't need marines because 2RAR already train for amphibious operations.
ADF needs to make it more attractive to join, stuck in its " i did it in my time so you can too" attitude. Posting cycles and instability are very outdated and tiring if you're trying to have a life outside of Defence which many people do want. Yea they can pay decent - but if you're always away from friends and family or wanting to maintain relationships; due to the nature of outdated posting cycles whats the point? the Mental toll is ignored and reduces morale. They address it but never act.
Problem with Australia is Labour doesn't like spending on defence. When in office they give platitudes but they delay and defer. Half of the Liberal Party are basically the same
On one hand you have China, our largest trading partner, who has attempted to interfere in our politics a few times, runs the usual spy games, made demands & has imposed trade sanctions. On the other hand is the US, our largest foreign owner, most of whose companies don't pay tax costing us hundreds of billions in lost revenue, treats us as a vassal, gets us involved in foreign wars we should have no part of, interferes in domestic politics regularly, has even been responsible for the fall of 2 Prime Ministers, & recruited another as an asset, sells us military equipment at outrageously inflated prices, ie Abrams tanks, Hercules transport craft, Triton drones & Virginia class subs. And who may not decide to come to our aid in any future conflict, unless it's a clear political & financial benefit to them. Yeah, a great choice. We'd be far better off practising armed neutrality. China isn't a real threat to us, unlike our northern neighbour, who has a large population, and a history of both dictatorship & expansion. Fuck the AUKUS subs! By the time we get them they'll be obsolete and obscenely expensive, we could literally buy triple the number of Soryu class Diesel electrics, have them decades earlier & hundreds of billions cheaper, freeing up the rest of the half a trillion dollars cost for other equipment or spending on Health, Education & Infrastructure.
Australia is doing what it is able to do as a small population in charge of a continent which is surrounded by bludgers and basket cases. The American alliance is important and it’s driven by Australia’s long term commitment to world security, which is something the Europeans and Asian’s haven’t a clue about as they view alliances as what they can get from them, not what their responsibilities are to uphold.
you've posited some very accurate historical references, but you haven't posited the culture of australia, vs communist influenced political parties. the overton window is significantly more destructive in australia than america
The ASPI ( australia strategic policy institute) says that australia must bye right now french nuclear submarines 😂 what a joke, I hope france will never give submarines to australia, australia don't deserve it. Leave the aukus program to the hypocrites and liars, France dosen't need aukus 😊
I found it a bit superficial. Basically an opinion piece, and a fairly standard one at that. Doesn't start with evidence and lead to a solution or set of suggestions congruent with its title. More interesting from what it says about the author than what it says about the subject matter.
The change came when Beijing issued it's 14-point list of demands to Australia.
Just an indication as to how ignorant the demands were, one was that Australian media stop criticising the PRC.
Aus rejected demands; PRC declared trade war. Aus won.
Due to the Asian face concept, both sides are pretending the PRC did not end up conceding and backing down, but they did.
Won the trade war, but didn't realize the complete Trojan horse that is mass immigration, including sleeper agents from China.
Aus won, so decimation of its wine industry is "winning"
@@johnpaul252003 Australia won. Accept it and move on.
I have to more than agree with @johnpaul252003 that "winning"; is a pyrrhic victory when your win also means you get to continue shipping Australia's irreplaceable resources to China for China's benefit.
@@johnpaul252003Jeepers! Who ever said our wine industry was "decimated"? Wine growers are among the richest people in the country. I believe the crayfish industry got hit quite hard, but there again it's not as if crayfish were ever that cheap to buy anyway.
With reference to the purchase of new tanks, I can tell you that, during the Vietnam War, we discovered that, in a company level engagement, the presence of a troop of 3 tanks reduced friendly casualties by 80%. Also, nothing is better at holding ground than a tank, especially if it has time to dig in. In the Australian Army, tanks are primarily for infantry support.
Agreed that tanks are useful. I think the real question is Australia's ability to get the tanks to the battle.
@@michaelshurkin613 I think that's true for basically every weapon system we have/on order... 2/3 of the f35 are going to be based in nsw, which is like 2000/3000km from Tindal or Townsville (the likely forward staging bases for any defence). I'm not sure that this is possible with just drop tanks.
Subs are based at ass end of the world...
But yeah 70 sepv3 seems excessive given the ability for us to move around...
Still get tanks, but light tanks would have been better and more cost effective. Then that money saved could of been spent on more redback IFV's.
@@michaelshurkin613 8 Landing Craft Heavy Damen LST100 built at Henderson Shipyard in WA
18 Landing Craft - Medium class also WA build
Place groupings of 50 tanks in separate storage areas spread across Australia. Have them all maintained and secured primarily by reservists. Send the active force around Australia in rotation to inspect and train with each of the stored tank inventory groups. Small active armor force, with over supply of equipment. This provides a quick reaction force to take control of some tanks and repel an invasion while also maintaining enough equipment to expand the force in case of war by adding manpower. This is essentially a strategic deterrent against invasion and will probably not be necessary to use in war but provides utility simply by existing for deterrence.
There's a cynical line in Australia about defence reviews: 'every defence review recommends 3 brigades, 100 combat aircraft, 10 surface ships and 6 submarines'. I might have the exact numbers wrong but it's close. That's what the defence establishment is comfortable with and what governments are prepared to fund.
Somewhat true, although our naval expansion (if achieved) does break that narrative. There also needs to be greater emphasis on similar capability growth in the RAAF.
I am a former Army Reservist in the Australian Army with a long term interest in defence and geo politics. The Reserves are woefully under resourced and ignored in defence planning. This is despite the fact that reserve personnel are an essential part of defence and were deployed to East Timor, Iraq and Afghanistan. In my opinion the reserves need to be more integrated with Regular forces so that there is regular training with both forces as interoperable exercises and regular soldiers on a 6 year contract being offered the chance to serve out their contract via reserve service for a longer time period.
Chocko
they need to turn up to work to warrant more investment to be honest
@@thebeautifulones5436 You mean like Monash ?
Your observations on the Army are valid. Australia will only receive 129 Redback IFV’s down from the original planned 450 to replace the M113AS4 APC. As you say, a mere 129 IFV’s is only enough
to equip one mechanised battalion. I expect the M113AS4 will remain in service which is less than ideal as it is obsolete.
It is worth mentioning the Arafura offshore patrol vessel which was based on the Brunei Navy Darusalam class offshore patrol vessel. This went from being a planned 12 boats with some decent weapons such as a 57mm naval gun to now maybe only two boats with nothing more than a 25mm Bushmaster auto cannon and 2 x .50 calibre M2 HMG’s, basically the same armament as the Armidale class patrol boats which are being retired.
The Arafura offshore patrol vessels will only have the armament to intercept illegal fishing vessels and people smugglers, not to project force or defend against a hostile actor. So a huge amount of money is being spent on what is a glorified police boat.
The Arafura debacle shows Australia needs a seperate coast guard body to enforce our EEZ and perform policing duties and let the RAN concentrate on war fighting with a decent littoral and blue water fleet equipped with corvettes, frigates, destroyers, subs, mine hunters/mine layers, maybe some fast attack boats to support SF operations by the RAN CDT, SASR and Commando Regiment and LHD’s capable of amphibious assault with dedicated logistic ships.
The current Advanced Cape Class patrol boats in the RAN should be transferred to Border Force Maritime Unit (a Federal law enforcement body) and then let the Navy concentrate on war fighting.
Agree with this 100%
Why the RAN is tasked with constabulary operations is beyond me.
I have nothing against the Navy assisting those operations where appropriate, but the Navy should be, first and foremost, a war fighting organisation.
Just a couple of updates of fact: The Australian Army contributed 1 x Corps of 5
Divisions by the end of the first World War in France. The first cooperation between Australian and US troops was at the Battle of Le Hamel on July 4th 1918. US troops fought under Australian Command there and later in the "100 Days" Campaign at the end of the war.
Australian soldiers fought in North Africa, Greece and Crete during the second World War but all Austrlian soldiers were withdrawn to the Pacific after the Battle of El Alamein in 1942. The RAAF and RAN did contribute to the European theatre especially Bomber Command in operations over European cities.
The French didn't propose their Nuclear Nubmarine to the Australians because there was a taboo with other countries that it wasn't the type of weapon that could be sold on the international market. So the French were upset that:
1 - They got no warning
2 - They were lied to
3 - They didn't get invited into AUKUS as an Ally while they have territory in the pacific and they are very much conscerned with Pacific security (unlike the UK)
4 - They had started technology transfert of their submarine tech to Australians Sailors
5 - They didn't get to even compete for this new contract which could have benefited Australia if they truly wanted nuclear Subs
6 - That the other offers can't even deliver the Boats when they were already being build in France (they will get sold to the Netherlands now)
7 - They lost the contract.
This diplomatic incident got played in the English media as the French being upset they lost money when it wasn't even in the top 5 reasons. It got painted as France being its usual Difficult self and asking for attention.
It reinforced very much the French thinking that there is such a thing as an Anglosphere and they will NEVER be part of the club.
The more worrying is not even betraying a close allied. The more scaring is for Australia which will never get its Virginia submarines before they become deprecated. Double betrayed.
@@henryfynn7562 They're getting block IV boats. Not sure what you mean by 'deprecated' but they have a 33 year service life and the ones being bought will be as little as 6 years old.
It was poorly and embarrassingly badly managed by our leadership in the UK
@@PJH13 Good. Australia will have 1 sub in 6 years. But ""No serious observer of the US submarine industrial capacity thinks it will come anywhere near producing surplus submarines for Australia," Senator Shoebridge, USA
@@henryfynn7562 Yh, they aren't meant to be. The boats being sold aren't new Block Vs; they're already built and commissioned in the USN.
Yes there's a delay, but there already was one on the Attack class. The differences is, the new deal plugs the gap via the US and UK are stationing subs in Australia to plug the capability gap, which France obviously couldn't do.
In fact, one of the original reasons for going for the French design was it was a nuclear design that could easily be reverted back to, once nuclear propulsion was politically acceptable - the subsequent experience suggested such a switch wouldn't be nearly as easy as hoped, so they revaluated.
It's always a pleasure when I see a new video uploaded from you - sometimes I like to listen to them while working, but then end up taking a break from work because I want to focus on the video. Refined OSINT discussions are just my favorite thing.
Thanks!
Excellent video Mr. Michael greetings from Colombia.
Thank you for watching!
The analysis we’ll never get from Perun. Thanks Michael.
Check out Hypohysterical History if you haven’t seen it. Periodic very in depth commentary with more history and background.
If the AUKUS kerfuffle taught me something, it's that the term 'Anglo-Saxon' remains remarkably relevant in international relations.
You could replace or supplement those words with “Liberal Democracies”
Yes, although I've always thought the term funny. I'm certainly not Anglo-Saxon, and at any rate, the Normands conquered England and imposed themselves...if anything, they should be called Anglo-Normands.
@@michaelshurkin613 - Anglo-Dutch, if we include the last successful invasion of England. Securing the Protestant succession and the supremacy of the Commons over the defeated pro-French party of the Stuarts.
@salahidin - Well, what's now Five Eyes was the oceanic fortress of the West in two world wars, saving Europe twice and Asia once.
@andrewcombe8907 no, you cannot. 5 eyes and AUKUS demonstrated that there is clearly 2 categories of allies. The privileged one, the Anglosphere. And then all the other ones, Europeans or Asians.
The problem with a single focus force is Australia has to defend a continent. Finland and Poland have to defend a border of no more than 1000kms. For most Australians that’s a trip to the shops for a bottle of milk.
Yes but you have to do it at sea. Not a massive land border with a much larger neighbour.
3:00 Australia didn't abandon the British Empire, the British Empire, specifically Churchill, abandoned Australia.
No, Churchill didn't - he guaranteed to divert an armoured division from the middle east in the case of a substantial Japanese invasion.
and anything after April 42 doesn't matter, because by then we knew (from magic intercepts) that Japan had no plan to invade Australia.
And the post war no Brits east of Suez - unless they have a shit ton of oil - sealed the deal.
Exactly, which is why in the occupation of Japan and in the Korean War, Britain was under Australian command, it was the only way that the Brits could be trusted.
Yeah, given that the UK was fighting for it’s very existence, with the threat of a Nazi invasion the UK government should have thrown all it’s resources onto the Far East theatre to prevent the the Japanese invading Dutch territory only a few hundred miles from the vast emptiness of the Australian North End.
What an ignorant comment @AndrewBlucher.
Are you aware of the 3 significant joint US-Australian bases in Australia, Pine Gap, Nurrungar and the Harold Holt Joint Naval Facility?
The force posture has changed from a 50km range, which was army focused, to a 200km + range which is an air and naval focus, to cut off threats.
Growing up in the 1970s, I still remember that having the 3 facilities mentioned above made us targets for the Soviet block with intercontinental ballastic missiles.
The younger generation doesn't remember that.
For a true reading of the change of allegiance from the British Empire to the the US, you need to look up John Curtin WW2 and Winston Churchill relationship (it was frosty after Curtin recalled 2 army divisions to defend Australia from the European theatre of operations
We are America's bitch whether we like it or not, Australia has no autonomy. Scott Morrison who set up AUKUS, well guess what he's a highly paid consultant now in the U.S. Opportunistic parasite.
to be fair apart from the joint naval base the positions of those bases could serve as good testing grounds.
The Brisbane line... But don't worry, Russian gangsters were invading the Gold Coast a few years back, with Bikie support... All the drugs... There's a lot that goes on that isn't really mentioned in internal security failing, right alongside military procurement being wtf as well.
Another great video, keep them coming! Would love to hear about some small state militaries (Singapore, Qatar etc).
Thanks. I've been tinkering with that. Singapore is easy; I know a thing or two about that. Qatar? Is that even a country, really?
@ Perhaps an Army with a country? And thanks for introducing me to castex 👍
Great but do tell the real story of why the Singapore Armed Forces was formed and who taught them their doctrine (not world's favourite nation at this time) and it's evolution. Retired banker but 30 years ago conscripted as an rifleman when 18 like everyone else there.
@@BrianPatrick-s6b Israel and Singapore still collaborating. Blue spear missile I believe 👍
Singapore's actual military doctrine taught by you know who is important else the equipment mix and training does not make sense.
Australia usually get ripped off by our allied partners. They know they do deals behind closed doors is my thoughts on the matter.
The AUKUS deal includes $3 billion as a coinvestment into American submarine yards to help address capacity issues.
It's not a bad analysis, mate. But some key points from an Aussie closely watching the affair play out.
1) we'll get the Virginia class subs. At the end of the day, the yanks will build, pay for, and crew them to patrol our north, OR we pay for and crew them to do the same thing.
Between that and upgrading our West Australia dock facilities to support Virginia class subs (which the yanks can also use), they have all the incentives to deliver on the deal.
2) cost comparisons for Aussie military procurements are hard to compare. We use total costs over the 30 year life span of the project including all on costs. The figures are far beyond the actual purchase of the subs.
3) Lastly, the French nuclear option required maintenance and servicing by the French every several years. They are considered unreliable and fickle, so they are not trusted like our US and UK brothers and sisters. It was a non-starter from the get go.
Also, the point at which we "woke up" about China was when they openly attempted economic cohersion (application of tarrifs) and released 14 "grievances" for which they tried to tell us to remedy.
The French are certainly unreliable, but it’s Europe not China that is our economic enemy, they’ve inflicted a punitive trade embargo on us for generations, even to the point of preferring imports from Russia over ours.
We actually pay a lot more than $2.6bn per VCS as of writing. Because of all of the shipbuilding inflation/escalation and new capabilities, we currently pay around $4-5bn for a Block V VCS con-VPM. I think the intent is to sell older VCS, but even if you tried to buy a Block V sans-VPM, you would probably run close to $4bn at current prices. $4.3bn is probably reasonable given the additional equipment and services a new operator would need.
I’m unsure about the whole nuclear submarine idea, long term if Oz wants to establish a nuclear industry, than yes. But I dislike the idea we don’t get these subs until 2040…. It’s kind of crazy.
it's too late to go back at this point.
Flexible is a word that comes to mind
.23 percent compensation payment to the French is a bargain compared to buying the wrong submarines for our new threat environment 🇦🇺
Abrahams were ordered in the context of the original IFV numbers so it’s not reasonable to question their acquisition on the reduced IFV order.
So where is Australia headed concerning this whole submarine disaster? Are they gonna have a gap between the retirement of the Collins class and the arrival of their next submarine? Or are they going to look for other options? Do they even have other options?
That's a good question. At this point it looks like they won't bridge the retirement.
The Liberal-National Party coalition won't cancel AUKUS because it will offend the Americans. The Labor Party won't cancel AUKUS because it will offend the Liberal-National Party coalition.
A solution would be to buy the Rubis class submarines that the Frenchs are retiring instead of the Virginia's. Of course, it would depend of the condition of the hulls.They could be refueled, modernized with US equipment as the Attack subs were planned to be. It would mend relations with Frenchs and help US with sub building program which is lagging.
@@philipperucquoy468
Why would they use French nuclear subs?
Surely it makes much more sense to refuel old Trafalgars or LA class submarines?
@PXDJACKERZZZ you cannot refuel US or UK subs. Other advantage are they are smaller and require less crew which is a factor for AU navy.
As an Aussie, Im baffled why we didnt go all in with the IFV's
In lieu of the Abrams?
@@michaelshurkin613 Negative, Sorry I mean they went from 400+ ifv to 120? something? I feel like we would need more than that. Dont want to end up M113ing it.
It's simple. As the govt said, we are not going to fight a middle eastern war or one in central Queensland in the next 50 years.
There is limited money and the army can't project power like the navy and airforce. Simple.
Because labor/ left are always week on defence and also they hate the army. They always want to gut it. If it wasn’t for the fact that the two armor (m1a2 and red back) projects were way into the advanced stages they would highly likely have cancelled them
@@Aussie-R How would we use 400 IFVs, how would we crew them, and more importantly, how would we deploy them? The thing here to remember is that we will have local and sovereign manufacturing here.
In the context of defence analysis we also need to look at Australia’s geo political role. We are the major democracy in the Southern Hemisphere. Below the equator we are the most powerful liberal democracy. Sydney is the New York of the Southern Hemisphere and Canberra should be the Washington of the Southern Hemisphere. We need to overcome cultural cringe and embrace this reality via active diplomatic engagement with local neighbours and strong defence ties with like minded allies in the region like the Philippines, Taiwan, Japan, NZ, Fiji etc. The Australian Federal Police can also play a role in this through peacekeeping operations. This also means we need a defence policy based on accepting that we are a regional leader as opposed to a mere follower of the US. We need to engage with local militaries by encouraging officer training at ADFA and Duntroon so that Australian officer standards are inculcated into our allies’ culture. Similar to what the British did with Sandhurst. Lastly in my opinion we need to transfer the constabulary/coast guard duties of the RAN to Border Force with a transfer of the patrol boats so that the RAN can just concentrate on war fighting. We should purchase corvettes with stand off missile capacity and maybe some fast attack boats for SF operations, build up our navy to a war fighting force and transfer the Cape Class Patrol Boats to Border Force. The AUKUS sub deal sounds like a boondoggle entered into for intelligence sharing and we should just get some German 218SG diesel electric subs like Singapore uses. I also think it is contentious but the Navy made a mistake in not having the Canberra class LHD’s able to operate the F35B to provide air cover for littoral/amphibious operations.
I like how you say that we need eliminate cultural cringe by comparing Sydney to New York.
@@hoilst265as comparisons go it is valid - centre of financial and commercial operations for the South Pacific if not the Southern Hemisphere.
The Invincible Class (what the Singaporean's call their version of the TKMS 218SG) are half the size of the current Collin's Class by tonnage, with I would imagine significantly less weapons loadout to accommodate the AIP system. Not to mention a completely different and unfamiliar combat system, at least the Virginia and the upcoming AUKUS subs had and will have a combat system we currently use on the Collins. No chance that they will be able to accommodate the same range and time on station as the boats we are slated to get. You have a point that the patrol boats are constabulary vessels, but they are also a training ground for sailors to eventually deploy to and command one of the Major Fleet Units. We have too few. Perhaps the eventual General Purpose Frigates will go towards solving that problem we shall see. Deploying organic air support aboard the Canberra's I can't see as being a good move. You would take up valuable space for an amphibious force to accommodate a very modest fast jet air group, 6-8 F-35B's that will not be able to provide around the clock patrols. The Arafura were an attempt to get into the corvette game again whilst also replacing the Armidale's and Cape's but they have been left toothless by the apparent inability to integrate the selected 40mm OTO Marlin main gun. Basically they are just bigger, longer legged versions of the Capes now, which is a shame. There is some talk of smaller missile boats which could be interesting The Whiskey Project has vessels the US is trialing for themselves at the moment that we could use. Maybe a win for Australian industry there.
Those german subs are far less capable than the aging Collins class. They lack the weapons, stealth and endurance of the Collins.
Very interesting and informative. I would say though, that while there was a lot of discussion in the media about choosing between China or America and some mining magnates were repeating Chinese talking points, there was never any serious debate in government about the primary importance of the US alliance.
That's good to hear.
@PaxAmericana do you think Australia would be better served with M10 bookers vs abrams. As the booker is in the same weight ~42 tons as the redback and offer a mobile large caliber tool to fill the same roll as the abrams.
Thx Michael, the "click" came as a result of a comment from the previous PM , concerning the origins of the coronaviras origin in Wuhan. It hit the Australian public like a kick to the "what it's", PM thrown out, military build. The second part about Subs, came about because, although many millions had been spent already, the French differing, could only be seen that it would last for years. Like all contracts, you go into them with knowledge of the penalty. Remember it was your President & British PM, that stood with our PM to confirm AUKUS. Now that might mean nothing to you, ( or even rest of world) but to us , it meant solid commitment . PS - immense work has already occurred in progression, Training/Maintenance/Facilities/Factories (both Au&UK).🇺🇸🇬🇧🇦🇺✔️✔️👍I hope.
I worry the US government promised something it couldn't deliver. I have reason to believe the part of the USG that engaged with AUS regarding a sub deal did not talk to the part of the USG that understands the state of US shipyards and SSN production and availability. I don't know this to be true, but I suspect it is.
I’d love to know what you think about the suitability of nuclear powered attack submarines for Canada. It seems we can’t really control our own waters year-round without them.
The opportunity cost of the Aukus subs is surely a huge distortion that if they ever arrive...offer too little bang for the massive bucks.
Eh?
There's nothing that offers more strategic naval flexibility than a nuclear powered submarine.
The ability to transit at 30+kts means that a boat can leave its base in Perth and be on station in SE Asia there in three days, not fifteen.
From there a conventional sub can stay on station for a couple of weeks at best, the nuclear boat can be there for up to three months .
The step-up in capability on these points alone, disregarding manifold other tactical and strategic advantages, should be readily apparent.
I find the 10 year heads up funny. mostly becuase we did (of china) but we didn't recognise and act upon it.
I’m sure the discussions around Virginia Class Submarines and the construction of them for the AUKUS deal would have been a little deeper than you suggest. Australia also committed substantial funds for dockyard expansion in order to facilitate these extra boats. Does it mean it will happen smoothly, or even happen at all? Definitely on the wrong side of history with that argument so time will tell.
At some point Australia was going to have to bite the bullet and suck up a long lead time in order to get Nuke boats. Is it smart to do that now based on Chinas immense and unprecedented Naval expansion and military build up? I wouldn’t have thought so. Surely purchasing 6 to 8 Virginia class boats would have been waaaaaaay less risky, first of class is always a massive challenge in both delivery and commissioning and that’s providing the design is both sound and mature. Using unproven tech is fraught with danger at every corner, those types of undertakings are best left to countries like the US that can actually afford the cost blow outs and emerging tech.
The other elephant in the room is the giant capability gap. Although our Collins class boats are a living nightmare for the PLA’s surface fleet, quite simply we don’t have enough of them. Even worse their operational availability is dangerously skinny. We may have 6, but there is never a day where we could see even 3 Boats at sea at the same time.
4 Virginia class boats for each coast and a smaller surface fleet is a much smarter (and safer) option I reckon. Subs are unrivalled when it comes to force multipliers. They don’t require 180+ sailors to man like skimmers do and their lethality is far superior to any warship at sea.
We need Nuke Subs, but waiting until the 2040’s before we see our own is crazy. Why wouldn’t you piggy back the lessons the US has already learned when it comes to Nuclear powered stink boats and just buy them. The US needs Australia to have this capability, maybe they need to be leaned on harder from our diplomats to remind them!
It is very rare that there is a comment this long that I agree with everything on xD.
> They don’t require 180+ sailors to man like skimmers do
In fairness the Caberra and Hobart classes are quite a bit more multi-role than anti-ship
> Although our Collins class boats are a living nightmare for the PLA’s surface fleet
I think that this is true where we can credibly project them. I think unwritten in your comment is we need to go nuclear for us to routinely project the subs out to the SCS (or atleast the passages through indonesia), which seems like it would be a slow and uncommon exercise with the existing collins fleet (and likely a similar issue with the barracudas).
I think the main criticisms of going with the virginias is how long we are going to have to sweat with the collins as they are, the TCO and the concern about underwater drone/autonomous mine advancement making them obsolete remain, but agree with your contention that there isn't really a better option
@ damn, here I was looking for an argument. 😂
Appreciate the response.
In regards to your comments, yes I am very aware of both the Hobart and Canberra class vessels capabilities but equally aware of their deficiencies. Our AWD’s are phenomenal vessels with immense capability, but have far too few VLS to be able to stay in the fight for more than a few high impact engagements. Their subsurface capabilities are very impressive with CAPTAS 3 and obviously Seahawks with Dipping sonar/sonobouys but still don’t hold a candle to a Submarines passive capability so really the only thing our AWD’s can do that a Submarine cannot is air warfare. We could use our Air Force to act as the deterrent, along with Global Hawk armed surveillance and other automated systems, including the unmanned/minimal crewed vessels we have on order. Let them be the floating missile batteries they were designed to do. Other than the physical presence of an AWD, those vessels could be replaced (more like kept in service but not expand the surface fleet) and the funds directed to more Subs and more autonomous vessels in the air, surface and below the surface.
Yes the inference regarding Nuke boats was their ability to get to the AO fast, but more so to remain on station for longer than any other capability we have now and faster. With their ability to remain undetected, any vessel from China or other unfriendly would have serious reservations (or a death wish) about wandering in to waters bringing hostile intent. Area denial is king when it comes to sovereign territory and sea lane protection, nothing new there but the disparity between say an AWD versus a Nuke Attack class boat is shall we say, “rather large!” I can say with great certainty that I know which platform I’d choose if I was going to sea in a brewing conflict! Survivability in high intensity war at sea is measured in hours on surface ships, on Submarines it’s measured in months. It’s not that hard to understand that we would lose our capital front line assets very fast if shit went down hill with little warning, history tells us that’s how it would play out, or even perhaps a false flag operation?
China has proven to play by those types of rules in the minor skirmishes that our ADF and other countries have seen first hand already, CCP just loves to have the ability to ‘save face’ or look like they are the ones being stomped. 🥱
Underestimating the lethality and force projection Nuke Attack class boats offer has been the Australian government way for many years, fortunately that is changing but I personally feel it’s still not fully understood by those who should know better in Government and Defence decision making. For sure, we need a surface fleet, but the current plan I feel is far too top heavy with GP Frigates and the new Hunter class/type 26. It’s already an under-capable ship, not a single one still hasn’t been completed by the UK nor has any of the combat systems or propulsion been tested. How can we be not nervous about that? As we know, Collins class Subs were an absolute nightmare for years, it wasn’t until Defence decided to kick emerging tech to the curb and go back to mature systems did we start to see those Boats in service. The Type 26 are way behind in the UK, they are expensive as hell, are too heavy and not fast enough. The Hunter needs 96+ VLS to be a serious threat, they are manpower hungry and they are unproven. We know how that combination has gone for us in the past, but even worse is they can’t stay in the fight for long which then puts our auxiliary ships in harms way in order to keep the Hunters at sea. Obviously Nuke Subs only come home when they are out of food or weapons.
Another giant elephant in the room is recruitment and retention. Quite simply Australia’s current young generations are not interested in serving our country. They have seen how we treat our returned heroes, they have seen the Woke BS that the ADF has adopted and they have seen the DEI rot go through the ADF like wildfire. Angus Campbell has done a mighty 👎 job there and it’s not going to be fixed any time soon. The Navy struggles to man the vessels we have now so how do they think they are going to man 6 new ASW FFG’s and 11 new GP Frigates? Plus the Subs?
I guess it’s easy for us to rock back in our chairs and say the Government is doing it all wrong. In the Navy’s instance, I genuinely feel they are but it’s just my opinion. Having 8 Nuke boats, 4 East and 4 West, along with 3 conventional Subs (off the shelf evolved type 209’s or similar) each for East and West that cover our littoral waters would be phenomenally lethal, deterrence scale would be off the charts! 3 x AWD’s and maybe a couple of GP Frigates and Australia becomes a country that is protected by real teeth. Her sea lanes and interests are protected, has its coastlines protected far greater than any current plan we are currently invested in.
Army takes up the task PROPERLY of Anti Ship missile defence with coastal batteries of JSM/NSM/PrSM both in fixed and mobile launch sites spread strategically throughout the North, our Mine hunters looking after the new smart mines we have procured and all of a sudden our strategic position and defence of our great nation looks a whole lot more robust, functional and most importantly actually achievable.
Yes, I know. I am living in a dreamland but as they say, nothing wrong with dreaming. Whilst I am at it, may as well throw a couple of squadrons of B21 Raiders in the mix to give those who have big eyes on “The great Southern resource” something else to think about eh? 😜
Aussie here...
Glad to listen to an intelligent and level headed analysis of our overall military projection into the 2040s.
I may be wrong, but I think you missed the US$ two billion we are investing in increasing sub shipyard infrastructure in America to increase build capability?
Also, what do you think about long range aerial and subsurface attack drone capability being developed in the mean time, as the AUKUS subs won't be ready until the 40s (all going well unlike the Collins Class debacle!)?
Surely drones of all types would be cheaper, faster to produce and could be produced in large enough numbers in a few years?
China's Navy is already vastly larger than Australia's and so I doubt they will wait until we are properly prepared before they attempt to dominate our region of Oceania.
What do you think?
We could have bought 3 more LHDs (1 extra amphibious assault to maintain operational reliability of the fleet, 1 very light aircraft carrier + long-range drones, 1 air-training carrier but also deployable) and 4-6 Arleigh-Burkes and a few oilers, for less than our current naval outlook procurement. And had better detection, anti-air, anti-submarine, patrol range, and to-shore strike range compared to anything the Navy has plans to do. Up to and including 2043. We'd probably have enough money left for "some reasonable submarines", as long as we didn't get screwed on the deals. And enough left over for the Army to get their stuff too.
Interesting that you spent so little time on the RAAF. The model the RAAF followed should be seen as a blueprint for western militaries to prepare and for lack of a better term "rearm".
The RAAF signed up as one of the original partners of the F35 program and there was enough lead in the F35 program that if there were delays, there would still be enough of the F35 force present to allow the F-18A's to retire. The biggest mistake the RAAF made during this time was retiring the F111 without an adequate replacement, however the F18E/F Super Hornet was quickly acquired. The RAAF then had a missing capacity in frontline electronic warfare. The RAAF invested in and spearheaded the development of the Wedgetail, and also added to the Super Hornet order the E18 Growlers. The RAAF made the decision to jump in on the last production run of the C17 globemaster and has now 5 (or 6?) in service. The RAAF could have bought another 6 easily as these aircraft are constantly being utilised and are rarely still. The RAAF also ensured that their assets had capability to hit far and wide replacing the ancient 707's with the KC30 aerial refuelling platform. The RAAF then procured the C27 Spartan, though I'm not sure why. There was no coordination with the Army on this, as Spartans cannot transport Bushmasters or the proposed Hawkei, they are essential for very light troop transport. The RAAF's sea patrol capability was now getting long in the tooth and the RAAF procured P8 Poseidon and the Triton drone. The RAAF is also in development of the MQ28 Ghost Bat, a loyal wingman drone. This was selected over the proposed 5th F35 squadron which would have delivered Australia 100 F35's. If successful, the RAAF would then likely go down the path of procurement of one of the largest loyal wingman drone fleets. The advantage of this is that you aren't using your piloted and highly lethal aircraft to babysit other assets. Before we finish with RAAF procurement, the RAAF also showed interest in the B21 program before pivoting to the AUKUS Nuclear Sub program. The RAAF has really been the big winner over the last 20 years out of the 3 service branches and is, frankly, the only service near ready to fight a kinetic war envisaged in the defence strategic review today. The RAAF is now at a point where it needs to either deliver a fleet of loyal Wingman drones (I would hope somewhere in the hundreds) or look to it's next major development and potential F35 replacement, or risk finding itself in 20 to 30 years where the Navy is now. Note that this comment started with entry by the RAAF in F35 program back in the mid-2000s, and only now in December 2025 has the last F35 entered service, the RAAF received all it's Super Hornets, Growlers, KC30's, E7 Wedgetails, C17's, P8's, C27's and everything else, however this took (including R&D) 20 years to get to where we are today. Sorry for the long comment, but I believe a case study should be done on the RAAF to examine how it successfully delivered what was effectively a 20 year modernisation plan so successfully.
You kind of glossed over a few things, like our LHDs, and the Army buying AH-64Es. You also kind of skipped over the RAAF, which is very well equipped, with E-7 AWACS, the same things that the US and NATO are buying, but Australia was first to operate them, as well as the RAAF aerial tanker force of KC-330MRTT aircraft. As well as the only operator of the EF-18G Growler EW Aircraft, outside the US. We also operate Triton UAVs and have developed the JORN radar network.
To play devil's advocate, he probably didn't cover them because to my knowledge they aren't actually covered in the white papers, and therefore probably doesn't even know about them.
I know, I know. I discarded for the sake of brevity, but kinda regret it. Anyway, thank you for watching.
Oh, I know (but yeah, the white papers just gloss over the army, really). I left out for brevity's sake.
Seems as things stand this week 19.12.24 the SSN-AUKUS design is going ahead - does the UK really need a sub this big?
Is the US supposed to buy them, or is Canada the third country in the deal?
Michael,
Thank you for such an interesting video. As and Australian I might be able to fill in some of the details that effect the way we approach national defence.
Australia was founded as a British colony in 1788 half way around the world from the mother country. Initial settlement by approx. 1,400 people was around Sydney. Our population grew and spread quite slowly. Our current population is 27.5 million with a land area of just under 3 million square miles and a shore line of nearly 26,000 km. Despite being a “settler society” an Australian ethos has remained since the time of first British settlement. That ethos is of an insecure people who have always been dependent on a “big brother” for protection. Up until WW2 we were dependent on Britain. With the fall of Singapore in February 1942 we changed allegiance to the United States and have been under it’s wing ever since. There is no concept of belief that we could be neutral and/or defend ourselves like many countries much smaller than us do.
Our economy is dominated by mining and agriculture. Back in the 1970’s we gave up any pretence of having a significant manufacturing sector - rational economics prevailed.
This background helps explain our participation in most of America’s wars since the end of WW2.
You mentioned our passion for building submarines in Adelaide (look at the map to see how far away it is from the major centres of population). After WW2 the South Australian and Commonwealth governments encouraged manufacturing industries to be established around Adelaide. This was to be a soak for the large number of migrants coming into Australia after WW2. In particular General Motors was persuaded/bribed to build a large car making plant where they made Holdens. During the 2000’s economics finally caught up and the GM plant closed creating a great deal of unemployment. So what did the two governments do to fix that? They established a ship building industry for war ships and the Collins class submarine. South Australia is very important to both major political parties at election time; neither is prepared to risk loosing votes by not having lots of navel ships and boats to build in Adelaide - no matter the cost to the rest of us. So you can understand why the French, the Japanese, the Koreans and now the Americans and British have to build nuclear submarines in Adelaide. I should add that we have only one very small nuclear reactor that is used to produce isotopes for medical purposes. We have NO nuclear industry - NONE!!!
So to two issues you raised:
First: Tha Abrahams tanks. Our current military doctrine as you accurately described is aimed at the islands to our north and east. Again I ask you to look at travel documentaries of any place inside our area of military interest. Then see how you would operate an Abrahams tank in the jungles of those places. It’s just ludicrous that military planners could think that was a good idea.
Second: AUKUS! Our GDP is AUD1.8 trillion. AUKUS will cost us AUD375 billion. The cost alone is astronomical. The 12 French submarines had a price tag of AUD90 billion - about a quarter of the cost. If we needed long-range submarines we were offered an excellent boat from Japan (I think we declined it because Naval command thought all the controls would have Japanese writing on them :-( ). The AUKUS deal was developed by a small group of Australian naval officers and three former US Navy admirals who were working as contractors for the Defence Department in Canberra. The sweetener for the US was the billions of dollars we are required to pump into US shipyards to help them up the Virginia production rate. Australian money going to boost American shipyards!!! As for the actual British/Australian built boats; they will simply never happen. Britain (unlike Australia) can’t afford them.
I better end now, this has been quite a ramble but I hope it helps.
Regards,
Peter
Thanks! Yeah, I'm skeptical AUKUS boats will happen. I've also heard mixed things about why AUS didn't go for the Japanese boats, including lingering anti-Japanese sentiment. AUKUS just sounds like a bad idea, and I believe it stems from some combination of US/UK diplomats making promises they couldn't keep and AUS people engaged in wishful thinking.
The cost comparison between the sub programs is wrong. You are comparing lifetime Aukus cost versus build cost of the Naval Group subs. The Aukus estimate is A$268bn, including two new bases and the Virginias. The lifetime cost of the NG subs was A$240bn. Not such a big difference. The Aukus estimate also had an extra $100bn thrown in as contingency, for a media headline total of A$368bn, just to toss fodder to critics for some reason.
Pretending to predict the future is a mug's game. Defence programs like this are always bespoke and difficult. But the two parties of government representing 88% of Australians are behind the Aukus program. It has momentum, treaties and contracts behind it.
Put it in context as well. It is not a huge program by the standards of bigger powers. The UK just paid A$1.2tr as the first tranch of a third of the cost of the joint fighter program with Japan and Italy. Aukus is loose change in comparison.
Peter, reasonable summary. A few insights:
I don't interpret the early history of Australia as one of an insecure people dependent on a “big brother” for protection. Particularly in the Boer War and WW1, patriotism towards England was the main driver of our involvement. In WW2 Australia was in the war well before Japan's involvement and the pivot towards America only occurred after Japanese attacks threatened Australia.
Australia does not require an nuclear industry to have nuclear submarines or ships as the fuel can be provided from the US or Europe.
Adelaide is a major city and the capital city of South Australia. It is not "away from the major centres of population". Adelaide has a decades long history of ship and submarine building and has shipbuilding infrastructure in place. Ships are being built there as we speak.
Australia had very effectively operated tanks in jungle from the second world war to Vietnam. Students of Australian Military history will be aware that Australia pioneered tank/infantry jungle tactics. When used correctly, tanks are extraordinarily effective.
It's a common thing for countries to use foreign investment in the development of technology. Australia did it with the F35 and as a result got them earlier and cheaper than most other US partners. The investment in the US shipyard will see at least on, and likely several, second hand nuclear subs transferred to the RAN years earlier than we could hope to build them ourselves. It is important to note that the next generation submarine that Australia will build has not yet been designed and will be a collaborative project between the UK, US and Australia. The UK does not have to build them for themselves for Australia to build them, although it is most likely that they will rely on UK components.
Other than that nit picking, good comment Peter.
Re the AUKUS class, Britain can afford to build them. Their GDP is 4.7 trillion and their defence budget is around 95 billion. They aren't starting from scratch either, they have a world class sub building industry in place.
@@michaelshurkin613 At the time the AUKUS decision was made we had the worst Prime Minister Australia has ever had - Scott Morrison (ScoMo to his friends and enemies). The whole thing was an ego trip. Several months later we kicked him out and replaced the Liberal-National coalition (right-wing conservative) with Labor (centre-progressive - though in hindsight that should be regressive). ScoMo is lucky that he is not doing jail time. But he gave the then Labor opposition 12 hours to agree with AUKUS and only two Labor politicians were allowed to know about it. That Labor agreed is an ongoing shame on them, but they are frightened to be painted as weak on defence.
Agree with your assessment of the air force and army. I just hope the ADF can manage the assets to get them where they are needed when they are needed; this is not easy given the distances we have to cope with. The purchase of additional landing craft may assist this. The Navy is critical and being grossly mismanaged by both the Government & ADF at the moment, with purchasing being political not strategic. We have to stop pay way too much for our ships and we have to put more guns and missiles on them; they like to buy a good design them remove almost everything that can shoot. CIWS's are paramount to protect against asymmetrical attacks like drones and small fast boats and not need to fire a $1million missile. None of the RAN ships currently have sufficient CIWS's. They also have to stop demanding massive changes to proven designs, this is what makes our ship so expensive.
For Australia, it really is all about navy(including submarines), marines and Air force on my mind. On other hand for regular troops they really only need capacity to conscript, arm and train them in case of great need, or few they can use overseas or rapid response. After all, Australia has a lot of buffer between them and realistic adversary. And even though there are countries nearby, at least as far as I know, they are not really considered that much of an threat. Australia really just needs to use navy and air force to keep any enemy as far as possible for as long as possible. By offensive and defensive means.
Maybe they could also field small fast response land army, and stuff like self propelled land and air missile platforms. Though I guess even those could just mostly be held in reserve, land based missile platforms, and scale personnel up in case of great defensive need. After all you have navy and air force. And those would really only be needed on scale when actual mainland needs to be defended, meaning conscription anyways.
Overall, my conclusion would be that they need to be able to project power for defense via navy, with light mechanized marines/troops that can bother aggressors as far as possible from homeland, or support allies. Then missile defense inside the country for land, air and sea, and I would say some small coastal craft. And ofc air force. Like said in video, I think tanks are kinda useless too, well, money not optimally spent. And yeah, they should just have doubled down on infantry fighting vehicle instead, it's necessary for any troop transport operation where enemy fire is expected, and it can be transported much easier to far off places. And unlike tanks, these are actually necessary, so having more of them in case of war is very useful.
We're not conscripting to fight some war the Yanks the start. You overthrew our government once before because of that; we're not giving you the chance again. Pretty much all of the drama we're facing is due to our (forced) alliance with America, a country, as this video says, is only allied with Australia so as to prevent a war reaching the redhats and rednecks in the US for ever actually feeling the effects of it while cheering it on.
How would AUS partnership with Indonesia ties with this?
That's a good question. I need to give that some more thought.
@@michaelshurkin613 I would love to see your take on this, i'd say its a topic that is video worthy. I saw a few videos from the YT channel "Kamome" and "Task & Purpose" regarding Indonesia as a potential front for a Cold War 2.0 if the south china sea would blow over. More perspectives on this would be gold. Appreciate it man, thanks from across the sea!
One very small point to this podcast that rankled is the misspelling of 'defence' in the Australian context. It's the Australian Defence Force and Australian Defence Policy.etc. If you can't get this small detail right then one may question what other mistakes there are.
Historically these are unchartered waters for Australia. The forward defence of Australia was by the British Far East Fleet based in Singapore then then the 7tb Fleet out of Subic then no threat with the collapsed of the Soviet Union. It is very expensive to defend Australia at long range as that means larger ships and submarines which costs a lot more credible cheaper options like La Fayatte class frigates and Type 214 subs operational range were too short from Darwin. However decades ago Australia signed an ancient treaty called the Five power defense arrangement which gave them rights to rotate forces out of Butterworth airbase in Malaysia (RAAF used to station Horbets there) snd the British Defense Support Unit at Sembawang Singapore ( the british maintain a couple of OPV there). I don't think Singapore mind a much heavier RAN presence there with destroyers and frigates since Singapore need Australia's Shoalwater Bay Training too
Do u mean basing RAN ships in Singapore? If so then that's very unlikely as it might change Singapore's geopolitical perception in the region... unless Singapore is in real danger of a military conflict n thus having allied presence around helps prevent that from happening. 😂
While the intention of FPDA was for the protection of Singapore and Malaysia, it now seems like a bad joke for the former in terms of cf avaliable military deterrence capbility. Nevertheless FPDA do allow the basing of military forces in Malaysia & Singapore. RAAF still maintain a logistic unit and rifle company at butterworth meaning they will hardly object and probably welcome increase RAAF prescence, the defense support unit at sembawang is always avaliable to
RN or any commonwealth task force of RAN if any is formed. Bases are such a dirty word these days...the US do not have bases in the northern territory they just rotate a lot out of Robertson and tindal
I would also suggest we need an airborne battalion with supporting medical, engineer and artillery forces as we had in 3RAR airborne battle group. This gave Australia a rapidly deployable force able to be sent anywhere on the continent or the region within 24 hours. We have lost this capability.
We aren't getting those Virginia's. The US isn't going to give us Virginia's while they still have LA class and aren't building that many. Secondly and this is the most important thing. We don't have the ability to crew a virginia class. We can barely crew our collins class subs that only require 42-58 personnel and so how are we going to be able to crew a sub that requires 135 to operate?
I didn't talk nearly enough about recruitment/manning woes. RAN wants to almost double the fleet..but where are the people going to come from?
While I'm not going to disagree with the major thrust of this, I will point out that a large part of the decisions are to have sovereign and local manufacture of armour, fires, ammunition, vehicles, ships, boats and missiles. It has not just been about the acquisition.... this Labor government has been the most proactive defence-focused government in 40 years!
Ironic that more often than not the party currently other side of the chamber likes to profess it is the one that takes defence seriously etc. The current government seems to have taken much of the DSR recommendations and decided to implement them. It will be interesting to see what becomes of the new fires brigade, the general purpose frigates and unmanned teaming for the RAAF.
You have to be joking about this Labor government.
@@harrysmith6561 No.... wanna refute it, dickhead? Here we go, girlfriend!
Hello from an Australian,
My thoughts.
After 1945 we should have just been a neutral country, we didn't need to fight in Korea, Vietnam, The Gulf, Iraq, Afghanistan.
The Australian government should have built large naval/airforce bases in the Solomon Islands and the north coast of Papua New Guinea, as well as naval/airforce bases with Israeli style dome defence systems in Darwin, Townsville and Broome.
Adelaide could have been the nations defence ship building Mecca.
Australia's motto would be,
" we aren't going to attack you, but if you ever think about attacking us..., think again"
Thank you Sir! Another excellent video where there was a lot to learn!
When looking at Australia being primarily a Naval-based force (and force projection), and given the recent development in Naval warfare (the case of the debacle of the ru Black Sea Fleet being a prime example), to me it screams Multi-role support ships / Ocean capable Drone Carriers as a way to help counter-balance the Asia-Pacific "heavy threats". This especially given the fact that Australia would not get involved in a kinetic war without (primarily) the USA and its regional partners.
As for the whole Australian decision to renege on the French submarine deal, don't get me started! :-) My best guess is this has more to do with Australia's political transition at the time where the US took advantage of the populism "nouvelle vague" in the country at the time, and not a rational decision per say.
After all, as Mr. Macron explained when that was announced, "France would have been more than happy to change the contract and offer nuclear subs".
Which reminds me that I havent yet watched last week's video!
Thanks again!
Thank you. I don't think the full story is known: Yes, there was a political transition, but who started the conversation? Did the US say to the Australians, "Psst...I have an idea..." Or did the AUS side start the convo? What was the UK role?
@@michaelshurkin613 true! Who knows! Talks about subs are usually like... subs! 🙂
Nonetheless it's going to be an expensive few subs in... 15 years from now for Australia!
May we remind everyone that you don't jump from a no sub shipyard country to nuclear sub shipyard country in a decade...
Nahhh, I think that my point about the Drones Carriers is going to have more pull in the foreseeable future because of costs and capacities.
Have you thought about doing a collab with other geopolitics/defence youtubers? Good time bad times could be a good prospect i think
Australia should have bought the stock standard French nuclear subs back in 2010 and we would likely have 2 in the water by now and 2 more well into construction. The first AUKUS sub will likely not be delivered until the mid 2040's, if ever (the ADF will probably change their minds AGAIN), which is absurd. Why make an agreement for something you have no reasonable capacity to deliver.
Bad research mate, Britain more or less abandoned Australia and had a Europe first policy in WW2. Even India was seen as more strategic and Britain said we can always retake Australia and Pacific after.
After many arguments between Australian PM Curtin and Churchill Australia 7th and 9th Divisions were able to return to Australia from Africa, but Australia 6th Division had to stay.
As Australian troops were returning to fight Japanese Churchill then redirected the Australian troops to Burma and then again arguments erupted from Australia PM Curtin and Churchill gave in, only issue now was the Australian troops recieved no security ships to defend them if attacked on the journey.. This is when Australia turned to USA for protection..
For me the biggest strange thing about the Australian Army is this; if it's been modelled somewhat around the USMC and is expected to be able to 'island hop' the Pacific in conjunction with the Navy, then it makes little sense to not invest into modern Light Tanks like the Booker M10 MPF or Light tank BAE. Surely being able to provide armoured support to landing operations would surely be more useful in a sense to the M1A2 Abrams (although I'm sure they will be good for Mainland support). You do touch upon this, but I think that the defensive ability for the tank should not be ignored for mainland and I suppose the occasional forward deployment via Hercules perhaps. I do think 75 is way too low though, given the tank churn in Ukraine, even if it can be argued that the Russian's aren't supporting their tanks nearly enough.
But if they are looking to increase fires, the cutting of the Huntsman self-propelled howitzer is a mistake. Even if they have to just sit on the deck of the LHD's, it can provide excellent support to island hopping. The order cut for the Redback I think is short sighted as well, Australia's APC's are the well obsolete Vietnam things, even though we have various Bushmasters, and Strykers.
As for the RAAF, I think if we are getting nuclear subs, we should invest in B-21 Raiders as well, even conventionally armed we could use them to clear out advanced fighter screens and destroy targets from BVR. I get the feeling that the authors of the relative defense papers were putting all their eggs into the Ghost Bat program. The F-35 order should not have been cut to 75 aircraft, as the RAAF originally pegged that 100 would be necessary for the protection of Australia.
You realise that 450 IFV was predicated on the idea that we would use them on the Australian mainland, right?
Think about that for a second.
It's a ridiculous concept.
@@tigerpjm I do agree, but I think the 120 or so we do have on order seems a bit low considering: a) they will still need to be used on the Australian mainland, b) island hopping and deployments and presumably c) will have to have enough to perform both ideally.
So 450 does seem absurd for numbers (although, I think they are trying to increase the size of the army to be 100,000+?) but what we will be getting seems so low given Ukraine tank and APC churn (even if we were to assume that we'd protect our's much better). Losses will happen.
@OniFeez
So if we're not going to fight an enemy on the mainland because it's, like, a really silly idea, how are we going to get all these IFVs to where we're fighting?
A C-17 can carry 3 at a time...
The Ukraine comparison is utterly irrelevant to our strategic situation. Who are we proposing to fight massive tank battles with across open terrain?
Australia uses armour to support infantry.
We will have the redback IFV and the Boxer recon vehicles, we don't need light tanks. The LHD's,and the medium/heavy landing craft being built can transport the Abrams just as easily. Also you cant forward deploy an M1A2 in a Hercules, they have to be moved in a C-17.
Your mistaken about a lot of this or you've misrepresented your understanding poorly. I'm an Australian and I'll try to amend your comments as best as I can remember the points as there are so many.
First off, fundamentally there are 5 branches of the modern day Australian Defence Force (ADF). There is army, navy, air force, cyber and space.
Well over 95% of international trade for Australia comes via the oceans but for the sake of fuel /time costs etc which are directly related to the nation's cost of living, the trade routes mean that control of a few key choke points are key. We don't have to secure all of the oceans around us, just the important navigation routes. It's not just commercial shipping, as you've correctly stated, we're a long way from anywhere, which also means that no country is a serious invasion threat so long as these key points are at the most kept secure, or at the least, kept in check. The sheer distance alone means that any peer nations world have to commit to a one way trip as they are at the extreme edge of their range, it'd be a one way trip as they're fuel /food etc resources wouldn't allow for a return trip. That's why Australia strives to maintain stability and prosperity for our regional neighbouring countries.
The reason why we wanted a domestic submarines building capacity was from the lessons learnt with our Oberon class submarines where essentially, almost an entire third of their life was spent traversing across the oceans to their nation of origin for & including servicing /downtime requirements instead of being on station, doing the job.
96% of our data is handled by undersea cables in the waters to our north.
Australia does have a sound understanding of nuclear technologies, we've had a nuclear reactor providing electrical power generation since 1958 with the Lucas's Heights reactor, the majority of the population has simply been against it because not able to effectively neutralise the radioactive waste and the inherent dangers associated with the technology as illustrated by Chernobyl, Fukishima and the USA's reactors fears from both the St Helens volcano and the incident's around Three Mile Island reactor etc. As far as the weaponising of nuclear technology we are signatories to the anti nuclear proliferating pact. Summing up this stance is that we haven't developed the infrastructure required for large scale nuclear operations or refinement.
There is a lot more I could say but this comment is long enough as it is.
Thank you. Very helpful.
>Well over 95% of international trade for Australia comes via the oceans but for the sake of fuel /time costs etc
Probably important to highlight that you can't really use that to "siege" (unless you are simultaneously attriting RAAF/RAAN/PGM) given that we are net exporter of food, energy and raw materials
> The sheer distance alone means that any peer nations world have to commit to a one way trip as they are at the extreme edge of their range
Also something that I don't think is appreciated is that unless you're landing at basically Darwin or Broome you have to do that distance again but over land to get to anywhere of value over impassable terrain for any sizable forces -- the outback will probably kill you before you get to any population centres.
>96% of our data is handled by undersea cables in the waters to our north.
I'm not sure how you are calculating this, but this is almost certainly overstated. I find it incredible to believe that Southern Cross is less than 4%, which is one of several that run out via nz/fiji/haiwaii (ie: east not through the north). It's probably important to note that something like 75% of the capacity going north is going via Guam (major US military presence), so we very likely have some shared US interest in defending that specific passage.
>we've had a nuclear reactor providing electrical power generation since 1958 with the Lucas's Heights reactor
This is very misleading, Lucas Heights is a research reactor not for electrical power production. Running a research reactor (I doubt there are any people involved in the design/build process left) vs building and using it for electrical generation in a boat along with differences along with reactor types (OPAL vs PWR) make it incredibly unlikely that the skills or processes are remotely as transferrable as you are indicating (and again... 1 team vs building out and operating a dozen boats). I would wager that the those who prepared the report have a deeper insight than you.
@@tomtech1537I absolutely agree with you on most points, the others really are not a case of black or white disagreement but ones of degree's of difference.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Flux_Australian_Reactor Lucas Heights has never been a power producing site it’s pure research/medical isotopes, that said your comment stands and the knowledge base is definitely there
then australia should have chosen french nuclear submarines. Their technology uses nuclear fuel equivalent to that used in nuclear power plants. You have to refuel more often than with American technology ( but that's still counted in years), but it's a process that Australia could have mastered completely.
Australia has a very limited ship/submarine building capacity…quite simply buy them off the self and stop trying to redesign/redevelop/reengineer.
The cost blow outs and the time it takes…
Our government has finally begun to simplify the process by considering buying new frigates from (2nd Tier…not Hunter Class) or at least the first few…off the shelf.
Where are we going to get the bodies to man these platforms is another question. Defence Recruiting had been in decline for a long time.
My understanding is why Australia went with the nuclear submarines was the charge in the United States Government and the Biden Government was the one who pushed the Australian Government to go nuclear.
However, if you are been paying attention, the builder of nuclear submarines in the USA has been saying that it is not possible for the USA to build any submarines for Australian, but the United Kingdom is desperate for work for their ship building yards.
So my guess is the submarines will be British with some USA technology or Australia will go back to the French.
You also need to remember that the available conventional submarines are too small for Australian use and this is why Australia can’t just buy a submarine off the shelf. Australia is surrounded by the largest oceans in the world and the Collin class submarine is a large conventional submarine.
Ditching the military grade satalite program is incredibly stupid…..as for corvettes why when you need a proper navy proper very sea worthy vessel like the hunter class
What is also incredibly stupid is the widespread reporting that jp9102 has been cancelled when it has not, and that is straight from senate estimates. They are looking at using a system that has satelites at different levels of orbit. There has also never been a suggestion of Australia using corvettes unless you would call the off shore patroll vessel a corvette. Possible you could look at the Australian general purpose frigate wikipedia page.
All up there is an intended investment of approximately $9.4 billion to the US and UK industries. According to Reuters.
I am not expert but ADF plan purchases with Army n Airforce seem reasonable but more IVF n boxers are needed like Bushmasters more were originally were produced to keep up with demand.
Navy has opportunity to be great navy but needs learn from history like Seasprite, failed bid of OPC n manufacturing in Australia.
Submarines should been improved Collins, 6 to 8 not 12 as crew issues. Although if this wasnt possible then Japanese diesel Submarines. Then we could gone French Nuclear Submarines or AUKUS Submarines.
Surface Fleet number? I say if Australian manufacturer can produce 1 warship every 2 years then 6 is answer, so this means 12 are built over 20 years. So when Hobart DDG was built there should been 2 improved batch. 6 Hunter frigates would next followed by improved 6 Hunter DDG to replace earlier Hobarts. 12 Surface fleet all the time, adding 6 VLS warships unmanned would help at sea but problem coastal environments.
Forget light frigates n patrol boats go Transfield OPC warship although bigger flight deck/hanger to handled Seahawk very similar Canada Halifax but 24 VLS but fitted short range hellfire missiles for drone boat n aircraft attack. The OPC would cover coastal areas better then large DDG.
While unmanned VLS warships are wanted unmanned PT boats like in WW2 is needed fight undersurface subs
Yes the submarines will be expensive.
However they will be effective and good value for money. Australia is rich enough to afford them.
Second the idea is to build up our own technological and industrial base . This applies not only to the subs but missile and munitions manufacture, and air and sea unmanned drones like the loyal wingman. Finally, demographics is an issue. However, Australia has recently greatly increased its immigration intake. This should provide more potential service men and women. Plus school and university courses are being introduced to funnel trained technicians etc into the armed forces.
The problem is time The Chinese threat will be greatest in the next 5 to 10 years. Much of the naval capability won't be acquired until after that time frame and indeed our navy will grow smaller before it grows bigger.
Michael is certainly Francophile and it shows here. Discussing the submarine ‘gap’ ‘created’ by choosing AUKUS but completely forgetting a key decision maker being the colossal delays and frustrations mounting with the French sub designs
That's fair. Though that came from the decision to.modify the Suffren and shift manufacturing to AUS. ...of course, perhaps the French shouldn't have offered the modified Suffren. It seems they underestimated the difficulty of the conversion
You are forgetting the geography part of this. Australia and its bases is very far away the southern and east China seas. The conventional powered subs would have between 7-12 days on patrol by some reports I have seen
Where as nuclear subs would have a hell of a lot longer
The 'colossal delays' and 'frustrations' were manufactured excuses to throw to the media and try to cover up Australian government incompetence in the handling of the subs deal from the very start.
@michaelshurkin613 yes like macron misleading a cock head like Malcolm turnbull, Australia's pm at the time, Scott Morrison being the treasurer. Australian tax payers lost billions with these two in government.
Australia’s official report stated that the French design met all previous requirements and was on track in the project process. They nevertheless chose to end the project at that milestone instead of extending it. This was not due to any deficiencies or delays or even the cost overruns but simply because the geopolitical situation had changed and the strategic need for nuclear propulsion was determined to be important enough to justify an immediate change in procurement plans. France has a nuclear powered version of course but this was immediately seen as unsuitable for Australia’s needs because it uses LEU fuel that requires refueling several times during its lifetime and Australia has no facilities or expertise for conducting those refuelings in Australia. They would have had to have made trips to France for the refueling which was seem as a strategic vulnerability. The Virginias and future AUKUS submarines will not require refueling because of the reactor design and fuel used. France could build subs that require less frequent or no refueling but this would require new reactors and different fuel at much higher enrichment, either HALEU or HEU. France has chosen to share their civilian and military fuel together which limits them to LEU or HALEU and so far they still use only LEU.
Again as a regular Australian, I've got to ask What the FARK are they thinking?! Why not just buy the subs, I understand providing jobs to our people but at such a HUGE percent of our defence budget?!
Do you mean why not just buy the AUKUS subs (or Virginia-class) and have them made overseas or just stick with the French Diesel electric subs?
The second is a no brainer, diesel electric boats have enormous capability deficits vs. nuclear-powered. One can go months submerged at full speed (they only need to surface when they run out of food) and decades without refuelling, the other has to surface every few days, travels at reduced speed to conserve power (not very stealthy) and needs forward bases to refuel, as their submerged range is quite poor. There's a reason the French Navy don't actually use them themselves.
To the former, the cost of buying an AUKUS sub or Virginia class isn't going to be materially less than the cost of building them in Australia so why not do so?
Yeah, the thing to do was to buy off-the-shelf foreign made boats, whether nuke or conventional, French, American, Japanese, or whatever.
@@michaelshurkin613 Agreed
Yeah, honestly I don't see Australia being able to keep up a robust nuclear submarine program on its own in the future so this might end up just being a continual cash sink churning out subpar results with more and more compromises to make things work - unless they somehow manage to port over an entire supply chain and body of institutional knowledge then maintain the procurement funnel.
Australia is a somewhat growing upper-medium level regional superpower as the main solid land mass, and is generally growing while the UK and other European powers have continued a slow process of decline.
Australia is not even a medium size power. With a population about 25m no Aircraft carrier fixed wing capable. Your defence is totally reliance on the US. You don’t have the military industrial base like the U.K. or French.
I think previous and current governments don’t really know if China is a threat, and what type of threat. Grey zone conflict, large scale peer on peer conflict or all talk but ultimately no threat at all. That said, the continual ship building is an obvious concern for the future.
Our government responded by building 9, now 6, frigates that have the capability of detecting a Russian or American submarine (not a Chinese submarine) at a cost of $45B.
They also want 8 SSN’s at a cost of $368B.
How about we don’t waste $413B on these 2 platforms and instead invest in;
50 Mogami frigates that can perform air, surface, submarine and MCM…~$25B
100 LUSV (2 for each Mogami) to extend their total VLS to 96….~$25B
200 super ghost bat drones but B1B size with range and payload to threaten Beijing…..~$10B, but can also perform maritime strike.
500 Ghost shark XLUUV……$11.5B
Total cost ~$71.5B, a larger more lethal force at a cost saving of ~$341.5B, total frontline 4500 personnel.
Can you explain why Hunter Class frigates won't be able to detect Chinese submarines?
Also, your numbers in relation to Mogami frigates are highly fanciful.
You don't just pay for a warship and then have it like you do with a jet-ski. It requires constant upkeep which costs a lot of money.
@@tigerpjmmy point about the Hunter is that it’s a ridiculously overpowered platform for hunting the relatively noisy Chinese submarines. For a lot less money we could have many platforms that can do the same job. The previous strategy 12 Hunters & 3 Hobarts (15 ships) would have had a crew of 2700, 50 Mogami would have a crew of 4500 (50 ships).
@@tigerpjmmy point is that the Hunter class is an overpowered platform for hunting Chinese submarines. The only reason for building the Hunter is if we think we will be threatened by Russian submarines…..unlikely. With a significant number of XLUUV even Russian submarines might not be a problem.
50 Mogami’s will have a higher manpower cost if they are all crewed, but if 30 are crewed and 20 are placed into storage for wartime the crew requirement is actually the same as the previous 12 Hunter 3 Hobart strategy.
The great point of LUSV and XLUUV is that you do treat them like jet ski’s, place them into storage until you need them. The benefit of a 50 boat Mogami strategy is that a large constant and highly efficient ship building industry can be put in place. If you lose one boat during a war it’s less than 2% of the fleet.
The overall benefit of this strategy is we essentially get 50 overpowered Arleigh Burke destroyers at a fraction of the cost. We also get a bomber fleet, something we desperately lack after decommissioning of the F111. Platforms we can continually build here in Australia…..and more than $340B cost saving.
@@tigerpjmsorry my explanation is confusing, what I meant was it’s over qualified. A cheaper anti submarine frigate would be a more appropriate use of tax payers money. 30 Mogami frigate has the same crewing requirement as the previous 12 Hunter 3 Hobart strategy, put 20 into storage until you need them.
As part of the multidecade nuclear-powered submarine plan unveiled on Tuesday, Australian taxpayers will pour “substantial” funds into expanding American shipbuilding capacity, understood to be about $3bn in the first four years.13 Mar 2023
as an Ozzie ........ AUKUS should be reclassified as U-SUKA ! just a another addition to defense procurement failures.
Australian Labour unions are very powerful and have demanded the subs be built in Australia. Sōryū-class already built would have been more sensible.
The adf is allergic to buying anything big off the shelf
Soryu whilst capable is not in the same league as a Virginia or Astute.
Not in the same league, but maybe good enough? Or, better than no boats, or a tiny number of boats at $5 billion a pop?
No, the unions aren’t ’very powerful’. They can’t force governments to do what they want. Governments have decided to build ships and other defence assets in Australia for various reasons, including their own political self-interest. Governments of both persuasions like to run on having provided or sustained jobs in electorates because they know that that gets votes or doesn’t lose them. Whether that is sound strategically is moot: sometimes it is, other times it’s not. But don’t blame unions for that. That nonsense is just typical right-wing propaganda.
Unions have nothing to do with it. It stems back to the Oberon class submarines where every single spare part and bit and bolt had to come 12,000 miles from the UK. Aust wants to be be able to service and supply its own subs with its own workforce and supply chain.
@TitouFromMars perhaps, but the French were originally given the tendered contract for the Barracuda conventionally powered submarines. This contract was cancelled because of time overruns, stage deadliness not being met and would've seen delivery at least a decade beyond due date.
ua-cam.com/video/a_Y4QQ8Hm3k/v-deo.htmlsi=o7BOLQ6tPjweps7c
Britain was far from cool with us focusing on our own interests in the Pacific. When Curtin, the absolute legend, withdrew Australian forces from North Africa, Churchill tried to have the troops diverted en route to Burma to protect British interests.
Churchill was not happy, although he was not in a position to do anything.
Also, you're still wondering why we "chose" to side the with United States: you've overthrown our government once before - you're not as big a fan of democracy as you like to portray.
The Australian government are clueless about what submarines the country needs or requires. With Trump to come into the equation again next year, the Virginia subs might as well disappear right now. Australia has to foot any bill for the US or UK if either country withdraws from AUKUS. We would be much better off if the Australian government turned to the French and purchased the Suffren. Yes, the Suffren need refuelling. But the cost savings are there, and the ability to get these boats sooner rather than later is a major coup for the French if the Australian government would stop thinking that America would save it from any threat from China.
From the outside it looks like there would have been a opportunity to buy French nuclear subs at half the price America wants for theirs. Already now the US can't build enough for themself. They simply dont have the capacity or manpower
The Australians cut the Swedes out of the comptition for new subs (while insulting and lying about them), awarded the the Japanese but changed their minds and secretly awarded the French the contract for new subs. The Swedes and the Japanese are furious. Time passes, the Australians keep paying the French for the new designs etc but in secret they are negotiating for a new sub from the Americans/British....
The French is never told, and despite seeing this as a big expansion of the French/Australian cooperation in the Pacific they are not invited into the new cooperation between the US/UK and Australia... They are not happy.
The Americans cant build submarines fast enough to satisfy their own needs and its doubtful if the Brits can build new subs. Good luck Australia LOL
It's been a wild ride. Those Japanese subs probably were fine.
Lukily we don't need our Navy for the defence of Australia. The airforce is the service that will be tasked with the defence of Australia.
A nice little video Australia should form the Australian marines for use in northern Australia and the islands with have 2 carrier no aircraft we need 24 F35b to provide fleet air cover and cover for operation in the islands scrap the Collins only one is sea worthy.
We have no carriers, we have 2 LHD's and their deck is not capable of supporting F35B's. We don't need marines because 2RAR already train for amphibious operations.
ADF needs to make it more attractive to join, stuck in its " i did it in my time so you can too" attitude. Posting cycles and instability are very outdated and tiring if you're trying to have a life outside of Defence which many people do want. Yea they can pay decent - but if you're always away from friends and family or wanting to maintain relationships; due to the nature of outdated posting cycles whats the point? the Mental toll is ignored and reduces morale. They address it but never act.
Defence is spelt Defence
Problem with Australia is Labour doesn't like spending on defence. When in office they give platitudes but they delay and defer. Half of the Liberal Party are basically the same
LNP spends very little extra. Both parties have struggled to get to 2% of GDP.
@JohnSmith-tl8pq I agree.
On one hand you have China, our largest trading partner, who has attempted to interfere in our politics a few times, runs the usual spy games, made demands & has imposed trade sanctions. On the other hand is the US, our largest foreign owner, most of whose companies don't pay tax costing us hundreds of billions in lost revenue, treats us as a vassal, gets us involved in foreign wars we should have no part of, interferes in domestic politics regularly, has even been responsible for the fall of 2 Prime Ministers, & recruited another as an asset, sells us military equipment at outrageously inflated prices, ie Abrams tanks, Hercules transport craft, Triton drones & Virginia class subs. And who may not decide to come to our aid in any future conflict, unless it's a clear political & financial benefit to them. Yeah, a great choice. We'd be far better off practising armed neutrality. China isn't a real threat to us, unlike our northern neighbour, who has a large population, and a history of both dictatorship & expansion. Fuck the AUKUS subs! By the time we get them they'll be obsolete and obscenely expensive, we could literally buy triple the number of Soryu class Diesel electrics, have them decades earlier & hundreds of billions cheaper, freeing up the rest of the half a trillion dollars cost for other equipment or spending on Health, Education & Infrastructure.
Australia is doing what it is able to do as a small population in charge of a continent which is surrounded by bludgers and basket cases. The American alliance is important and it’s driven by Australia’s long term commitment to world security, which is something the Europeans and Asian’s haven’t a clue about as they view alliances as what they can get from them, not what their responsibilities are to uphold.
you've posited some very accurate historical references, but you haven't posited the culture of australia, vs communist influenced political parties. the overton window is significantly more destructive in australia than america
I chose not to get into AUS politics. But it is a big factor.
The ASPI ( australia strategic policy institute) says that australia must bye right now french nuclear submarines 😂 what a joke, I hope france will never give submarines to australia, australia don't deserve it. Leave the aukus program to the hypocrites and liars, France dosen't need aukus 😊
I get that, but I also think we'd all be better off if AUS had new subs, however they might be powered.
has to change as warped china will soon begin a miltary expansion within the pacific, Han chinese want to rule the west pacific roost
I found it a bit superficial. Basically an opinion piece, and a fairly standard one at that. Doesn't start with evidence and lead to a solution or set of suggestions congruent with its title. More interesting from what it says about the author than what it says about the subject matter.
Spoken like someone with absolutely no idea about Australia, its defence goals and its needs.
And now over to our experts in the comment section..... 😂😂
Some offer real expertise, so I'm often pleased.